


Achilles' Last Stand

by volatilehearted (anomalagous)



Category: Captain America (Movies), Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: M/M, Slow Burn, marvel crossover, multiple background relationships - Freeform, stucky au, this one is gonna take a while
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-12-28
Updated: 2018-04-27
Packaged: 2018-05-09 22:12:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 66
Words: 106,553
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5557442
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anomalagous/pseuds/volatilehearted
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>With the collapse of S.H.I.E.L.D. and the discovery that his childhood best friend, Stiles, is still alive in the form of the brainwashed Argent Wolfhound, Captain Scott McCall's life has been upended once again. But while he'd rather be spending his time searching for the elusive Wolfhound, a new threat has arisen that requires the help of the Avengers and Captain America, one that Scott can't ignore...</p><p>A Sciles-as-Stucky crossover, loosely following the Captain America and Avenger movie timelines. Fic currently up to date through Winter Soldier and working through Age of Ultron.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

It was snowing in Brooklyn.  


That wasn’t new. It snowed in Brooklyn all the time, in the winter months.  


Scott McCall was bleeding from a cut on his nose.  


That wasn’t new, either. Scott McCall bled in Brooklyn all the time, regardless of the month.  


He supposed he should be grateful. _This_ time, it was just a cut on the bridge of his nose. The blood was minimal, and it was running down the side, mostly out of the way. The biggest annoyance was the way he found himself reflexively licking his lips when the line of blood got to them, and the resultant burst of copper-iron taste in his mouth. That was fine, mostly. Blood in his mouth beat blood in his eyes, and blood in his _eyes_ beat some of the alternatives that meant not bleeding at all. It was better than letting the bullies win.  


Even from three stories up, the tension that New York seemed to grow out of was palpable. He could sense it in the air, see it in the way the people moved along the sidewalk, feel it thrumming up through the concrete and steel to vibrate under his hands. He could hear it in the footsteps below him, climbing up the fire escape ladder to join him on his landing. It was a city caught between the knowledge that it was at war and the knowledge that the war was still far away, made somewhat unreal by the distance. Some of them didn’t think about it at all, except for how the rationing and the war effort inconvenienced them, and Scott could see it in their faces. It drove him just a little bit mad, watching from the other side of that coin where he thought about it all the time. He wouldn’t have considered himself a violent man, and yet -  


Fighting was never far from his mind.  


One landing below him on the fire escape, someone jumped up and rapped their knuckles roughly against the sole of his shoe. Moving his foot to one side, Scott could look down through the grill of the metal to see the face of his closest friend peering up at him.  


“I can’t believe you made me climb up here just to have a decent conversation.” Stiles was grinning, lopsidedly, shading his eyes with one hand against the sun glare on the snow. “...did you manage to get your nose broken _again_?”  


Scott found himself grinning in return, lifting one of his own hands to prod at the cut, the bridge of his nose, his cheekbone all in turn. “I don’t think so. I let them off easy this time.”  


“Uh-huh. Why don’t you take pity on me, too, and come on down? We can go to the deli on the corner and get out of the snow.” Stiles lifted his eyebrows like he could offer up the suggestion on them to reach Scott’s level.  


“Yeah, yeah, I’m coming down, keep your pants on.”  


They were both back on the solid ground of the sidewalk before Scott realized that Stiles was dressed in the neat-pressed lines of an Army dress uniform. It made him look even more awkward than Stiles usually was, somehow, emphasized his shoulders in a way that made him seem a bit top-heavy. He had his hat tucked under one arm, hair slicked back, and the whole vision made Scott’s heart sink down through his ribcage. “Got your orders, huh?”  


Stiles’ smile dropped a little, the corners falling. His eyes dropped a second later, looking down somewhere in the vicinity of his toes. There was something very guarded in his gaze when he finally looked back up at Scott’s face, like he was searching for understanding. “Yeah. Sergeant Stilinski, at your service. I pack up to leave for the base in the morning.”  


“In the _morning_?” Forget through his ribcage; Scott’s heart bottomed out and landed on the sidewalk with a thud only he could hear. He left it behind as he paced Stiles on their way to the deli.  


He and Stiles had tried enlisting at the same time. When Stiles had first come to him expressing interest, Scott had thought maybe he was drunk - Stiles wasn’t the best with authority and he certainly didn’t do well with highly rigid schedules and rules he _had_ to abide by. It wasn’t until Stiles had revealed that he’d had relatives in Poland still, ones that they’d lost contact with, that Scott understood Stiles’ need to take the fight to the Nazis. Family had always been important to Stiles, but it had become measurably _moreso_ after his mother had died. Scott could easily believe that Stiles’ stubborn need to punish an entire army for their transgressions against the Stilinski bloodline was greater than Stiles’ inability to follow orders.  


For Scott, it was less personal. He just wanted to make a _difference_. He could recognize evil when he saw it, and currently _evil_ was sweeping across Europe, razing and burning everything in its path. Something deep inside of Scott, some elemental component of his being, couldn’t stand to sit around safe at home while that was happening, doubly so if his best friend was determined to run straight into the conflict.  


The Army had been happy to take a young, headstrong and able-bodied man with a whip-snap mind. They’d been a little more reluctant to accept his small, weak, asthmatic best friend.  


Which is to say they’d said _no_ to Scott when they’d said _yes_ to Stiles.  


Scott had already known that. He’d gone back at least a dozen times since then, trying to prove that he could manage anything they asked of him, that he deserved to be at Stiles’ side going into the war as he’d already been for everything else. At least a dozen times, they’d rejected him, each time with less patience than the last. Now, Scott was going to be asked to stay behind while Stiles went across the ocean to put his life on the line.  


The tailspin of   _this might be the last time I ever_ see _Stiles_ was interrupted by a hand on his shoulder and a concerned, familiar voice. “Hey, buddy. You still with me?”  


“Yeah, I’m still…” Scott shook himself back into the present, trying to offer up a smile to Stiles that he wasn’t really feeling. “I guess I just didn’t expect it to be so soon. I thought maybe we’d have more time to--”  


Stiles cut him off with a wink, the same kind of overly-obvious, awkward ones he’d been giving for years. “Hey, hey, don’t worry about that. We’ve got plenty of time. Besides, I’ve got something I think you’re gonna want to hear that’ll make up for a lot. I just desperately need a pastrami on rye first.”  


Scott was relatively certain nothing could make up for the fact that by this time tomorrow, Stiles would be far away and getting further, but he nodded his agreement, falling into step next to his friend.  


The deli wasn’t far, and with the war rationing in effect, there was hardly ever a line. Stiles seemed to figure, fairly, that _getting deployed_ was as good a reason as any to spend his meat rations, so he went to the counter to get them both sandwiches while Scott selected one of the many free tables and tried not to think too hard about the black clouds now looming on the horizon.  


By the time Stiles came to sit down with their food, Scott had utterly lost all appetite. All he could think about was the Army, that they were taking his best friend away but they wouldn’t take him _too_. He thought about the front lines, all the fighting and the carnage and the _death_ , and his stomach actually did a small flip, which was the opposite of helpful when it came to finding that sandwich appetising. “...so where are they sending you? Can you tell me that much?”  


“Acshully,” Stiles’ words were slightly distorted by the massive amount of pastrami he was now tucking into one cheek. Manners weren’t exactly his forte. “I need to talk to you about that. Remember that thing I was telling you about that I thought you’d be interested in?”  


“Stiles, that was half an hour ago at the most. I remember.”  


Nodding, Stiles took a few moment to actually clear his mouth of food. When he was finished, he leaned in over the table, dangerously close to dragging the bright brass buttons on his jacket through his pastrami. When he spoke, it was with a low and conspiratorial tone, like he was sharing secrets with Scott that couldn’t share. Actually, he probably _was_. “So a few months ago, an Austrian scientist who goes by Fenris escaped Axis territory and brought with him some really incredible news as a gesture of goodwill. _Apparently_ , the Nazis are _very_ interested in the occult and what Fenris calls their _Wolfsmensch_ program. Long story short, they’re trying to create some kind of super soldier, one that will be faster, stronger, more durable, and better at soldiering than the average Joe on the street.”  


Scott frowned, his mouth pursing around an unfamiliar expression. “Okay. So what does that have to do with me? Or _you_ , for that matter?”  


“I got assigned to help recruit for the Army’s _Project Lycan_ , which, like you might guess, is basically good ol’ Uncle Sam trying to get a jump on the Krauts and do the super soldier thing sooner and better, without some of the really, uh...troublesome parts of the program.” Stiles gestured with part of his sandwich, flapping cured meat through the air. “I thought you’d be a great candidate for it.”  


Surprise made Scott sit straighter in his seat, although he struggled to keep his voice quiet. “ _Me_? You thought the guy that the Army didn’t want at _all_ would be a good candidate for their _super soldier program_?”  


“Yep.” Stiles seemed almost _proud_ of himself, the right corner of his mouth curling up in a lopsided smirk that had been Stiles’ mainstay for as long as Scott had known him. “Imagine how dramatic that would be. It would _really_ prove the effectiveness of their program, wouldn’t it? If they made a _super soldier_ out of a guy they weren’t even willing to enlist at _all_ beforehand.”  


Something fluttered inside of Scott’s ribcage that he couldn’t quite identify. He hoped it wasn’t going to turn into another asthma attack. “But what about you? You’re already recruited for this program, why don’t they want to turn _you_ into a super soldier?”  


Stiles’ response was mostly a laugh, muffled by more pastrami, a little messy and a little gross. None of those things were new to Stiles, either. “I lack the, uh, ‘appropriate attitude’. I’m already defiant enough, they aren’t going to give that kind of power to somebody who they’re afraid might go off and do his own thing. They’re looking for, what’s it called? _Moral fiber_. I’ve basically got none of it. But _you’re_ actually made out of it. So you’d be perfect.”  


He raised a finger to forestall any more doubts or questions from Scott, clearing his mouth a second time so that he could continue speaking once more in that low, intent-sounding tone. “Basically, my thinking is this: you go meet with these scientists and sign up for the super soldier program. It’s a _little_ risky, but, hey, you were willing to risk your life for your country or whatever anyway, so there’s no change there. You ace the program and they deploy you into the field with a handler. That’s me. You use your moral fiber to keep me from going rogue and I use my pragmatism to keep your compassion from getting in the way too much because it’s war. We kick a lot of Nazis in the head and come home big heroes.”  


It felt like Stiles had tried to cover all angles. Something warm moved through Scott at the thought, that even knowing that the Army had been utterly disinterested in Scott’s desire to serve, Stiles had gone out of his way to help and arrange for Scott to be able to circumvent the rules. He’d made a lot of effort to keep them together, and Scott couldn’t express how _important_ that was to him. Who knows what Stiles had needed to do to get access to this, or who he’d sucked up to. The least Scott felt he could do was give it a chance, to reach out and take his one, single opportunity to go _with_ Stiles and make a difference, and clutch to it tight with both hands.  


Resolve solidified in his belly and brought his appetite back with it. Scott found himself smiling as he reached out to pick up his sandwich with both hands. “Okay. I’ll do it. After lunch, you can take me to meet these scientists and hope they have as much faith in me as you do.”  


Stiles’ smile reflected back at Scott, proud and hopeful and altogether too boyish for a man in uniform. “ _That’s_ my boy.”  


  
  



	2. Chapter 2

Scott was beginning to regret that pastrami sandwich.  


It sat in his stomach like a ball of lead, heavy and just as unappetising, as Scott sat in the waiting area of Project Lycan. Stiles had been taken into the back area immediately upon their arrival and Scott had been alone since. He wasn’t exactly sure how long it had been, without a watch or a clock, but he would have guessed he was pushing an hour of sitting and waiting.  


The Project, as it turned out, was being carried out right in their backyard, figuratively speaking. After lunch at the deli, it had been a short taxi ride to the other side of Brooklyn, near Queens. On the outside, it had looked like just another pawn shop for the poor and desperate of New York to sell their memories at. In fact, it had looked like that on the _inside_ , too, until Stiles had stepped up to the counter to speak some kind of arcane pass phrase and they were suddenly ushered through a hidden door in a false wall into a complex dug in under the city.  


The tunnels had been cast in concrete with little relief in terms of color or ornamentation. Scott supposed it made sense: the government had a lot more to deal with than whether or not its top secret bunkers had warm, inviting furnishings. They probably wanted the exact opposite of warm and inviting. This was probably a test, meant to see if he could be made to feel uncomfortable or twitchy, being left alone in a strange place for hours on end. What they didn’t seem to understand was that Scott had grown up with one of the twitchiest, least comfortable people on the planet. Scott had plenty of practice being the solid, stoic one, the constant counterpoint to Stiles’ erratic dynamism. His patience had been honed on the finest of whetstones. He could wait a long time, even in the absence of color.  


As it turned out, Scott didn’t have to wait much longer. The only door that lead deeper into the hidden complex opened to reveal a middle-aged man in a labcoat, one with greying hair who looked like he’d been carrying the weight of the crumbling world on his shoulders. “Scott McCall?”  


Scott stood up immediately, smoothing both hands down over his shirt before offering his right one out. “Yes, sir, that’s me.”

“I am Doctor Fenris. It is good to meet you, Mr. McCall.” The man’s handshake was just as weary as his face seemed to be, but Scott wasn’t going to hold that against him, especially not after he introduced himself. He had every reason to seem weary, after having escaped from the clutches of the Axis powers. That was enough to tarnish anyone’s soul.  


The doctor had a way of looking out of that weary face that felt like it was disassembling Scott into base elements, the building blocks of his very being. Still, his voice was gentle despite how charged the statement seemed. “So Sergeant Stilinski seems to think you’d be an excellent candidate for Project Lycan. He couldn’t _stop_ telling us that he thought you would be an excellent candidate. But I’d like you to know why _you_ think you’d be a good fit.”  


The question seemed almost like a sudden anchor wrapped around his neck. Scott didn’t have an answer for it, not one that felt _satisfactory_ , and he knew it. Something sank in his chest, and Scott found it hard to meet Dr. Fenris’ eyes, feeling like this slim opportunity was already sliding out of his grasp. “Honestly, sir, I don’t know how to answer that. I want to help. I want to make a difference.”  


“There are plenty of opportunities to make a difference here in New York. What makes you want to go to war?”  


Scott shrugged, still unsatisfied with his own responses. “There’s also a lot of people here who can and will help fellow New Yorkers, because it’s far from the fighting and less of a risk. There are a lot of people in Europe who are dying because somebody got it in his head that his ideas were so much better than other peoples’ that he could kill them over it. There are a lot of people over there that need to be protected. Plus, Stiles is going, and I would like to stay with him if it were possible.”  


Nodding as if that explained anything at all, Doctor Fenris turned and gestured behind him, through the door that lead deeper into the facility. “Walk with me, Mr. McCall. I wish to learn about you. Tell me. Are you from here in New York?”  


Falling into place behind the doctor, Scott allowed himself to be drawn into the hidden base. The corridor beyond the door wasn’t, as it turned out, much more interesting than the door or the waiting room.  It was long and drab, with a second door at the other end, clearly meant as a containment measure in case something went wrong. “Yeah. Stiles and I both, Brooklyn born and raised.”  


“What about your parents? How do they feel about you potentially taking on such a dangerous project?” Dr. Fenris guided them to the end of the hallway, knocking on the door there only to be checked and, apparently, approved by someone on the other side of the small window in the door. It opened deceptively quietly.  


“My father left when I was eight, so I haven’t cared what he thinks about much of anything for years.” Scott had long since lost the bitter pain that had once come with the memory of his father’s abandonment. What was left wasn’t really anything, not even hollowness. It was better that way. “My mother was a nurse in a TB ward here in the city. She caught it, too, and couldn’t kick it. She passed about a year ago.”  


Passing through the door revealed a large, vaguely circular room with a lot of machines in it that Scott could not recognize. There were a pair of armed guards at every door, including the one that they were entering through, their expressions a sort of disaffected, bored stare that usually meant they were actually ready for anything to happen at any moment. In the very center of the room was some kind of chamber, overlooked by an observation room with dingy glass windows. Fenris led Scott across the room towards another door without explaining any of the paraphenalia. “Sgt. Stilinski tells me that you have attempted to enlist many times, despite being rejected by the Army.”  


Scott had a thousand and one questions about the equipment in the room, but he knew better than to expect he’d get any answers at all until he’d be accepted into the program. He kept his questions to himself, instead explaining, “Yes, sir, I think I am at six or seven times. They feel with my asthma, I would not be able to serve as a soldier overseas. I respectfully disagree.”  


“They’re right,” Dr. Fenris said with something that sounded like an amused, tired chuckle in his voice. “The asthma would kill you before the Nazis could. But perhaps there is something to be done about that. Tell me, Mr. McCall. What do you know of the occult?”  


“The occult?” Scott himself felt he might laugh, as they left behind the room of equipment and passed into the first part of the bunker that had anything he might have called _decorations_. The walls had been draped in cloth of dark browns and reds, giving the lights inside a warmer feel. This was obviously housing of some kind. “You mean, ghosts and witches and things like that? I’m not so sure, sir. I’ve never seen anything to indicate it’s anything but people wanting to believe there’s something more out there.”  


Dr. Fenris guided Scott through to one of the alcoves, gesturing that he should sit down on one of the beds inside. The doctor sat down on the one opposite, leaning forward to clasp his hands between his knees. “What if I told you that it is very real? That it is the basis of this project, and the one that the Nazis are engaging in, which we are trying to counter, all of it is based firmly in the very real occult?”  


Something seemed to itch at the back of Scott’s mind, like he wanted to deny the possibility. He had always been reasonably grounded, _had_ to be to provide the stable landing place for Stiles’ flights of fancy. “I...I’m afraid I would have to remain a bit skeptical, sir.”  


“He’s absolutely right.”  


The voice came from the doorway, prim and clipped and feminine. A tall woman stood there, one that Scott had not seen approach, her hair carefully pinned up. She had a stance of confidence, as if she were the sort of woman used to being obeyed. She looked over Scott in the same way someone might look over a wardrobe they were considering purchasing. Her attention flicked to Doctor Fenris almost as if Scott wasn’t even there. “Are you sure?”  


The doctor also turned his attention to Scott, giving him the same cool scrutiny that the woman had given him. The consideration lasted long enough that Scott had just started to grow uncomfortable when Dr. Fenris looked back to the woman and nodded. “As sure as I can be. The only thing that holds him to New York is already being deployed. He is eager to help but not eager for violence. I think, with Sergeant Stilinski’s help, he could be just the answer we’re looking for.”  


Scott straightened, then, his eyes glancing between Fenris and the newly arrived woman. “Does that mean I’m being accepted for the project?”

  
There was something absolutely predatory about the way the woman turned to focus her attention back on him. “That’s right. Congratulations, Mr. McCall. We’re going to turn you into a werewolf.”


	3. Chapter 3

The silence that filled the room felt thick enough to be pierced.  


“I’m sorry, but _what_?” Scott looked between Fenris and the woman, but both of them seemed utterly serious. He couldn’t quite wrap his mind around the comment, stuck in an endless loop of searching either face for answers.  


Dr. Fenris sighed, quietly, reaching out to gesture towards Scott like he might have touched Scott’s knee without actually doing it. “I am sorry, Mr. McCall. My colleague has a flair for the dramatic. This is Mrs. Talia Hale. She is an accomplished scientist and also a subject matter expert here at Project Lycan--”  


“A subject matter expert on _what_?” Scott found himself interrupting, his voice incredulous. “ _Werewolves_?”  


“Talia, perhaps you could _show_ him?”  


She drew in a long breath, as if she found the question wearying, and then the face of Mrs. Talia Hale simply _changed_.  


Scott had no better word for it. She _shifted_ , her eyebrows becoming fuller, her nose gaining flatness near the end and seemingly permanent snarl-wrinkles along the bridge. Hair grew out along her jawline, her ears tapered upwards, _fangs_ appeared when she opened her mouth. Lastly, Talia opened her eyes and Scott was startled to find they were _glowing_ a particularly infernal shade of red. She allowed her features to remain so changed for what seemed like an eternity, while Scott took in all the details and finally noticed the wicked-looking claws that had replaced her fingernails. When she seemed satisfied that he’d seen enough, Talia flowed seamlessly back into her human face, her voice warm with amusement when she finally spoke. “You see now? Werewolves are _real_.”  


“Oh, God.” Scott said, in a quiet, shaken voice.  


“Werewolves,” Dr. Fenris cut in, seeming to notice Scott’s discomfort, “Have existed for centuries, perhaps as long as Man himself has existed. They are only one of very many occult creatures hiding amongst us, but they are perhaps some of the most powerful. There are many advantages to being a werewolf. Unfortunately, to be one who has become a werewolf the natural way, there are many disadvantages. Our project has hoped to eliminate some of them.”  


Scott lifted both hands to scrub them over his face, trying to find his center. It wasn’t there, he was almost certain. His center had been completely knocked off-kilter, his gyroscope shot. “...can...can you maybe explain to me what you mean?”  


It was Talia who responded, her voice more gentle this time. “Werewolves are stronger and faster than humans are. They can hear, see, and smell much better than a human can. They heal from almost any injury exceptionally rapidly. On the downside, most werewolves have trouble handling their temper, and are vulnerable to certain substances like wolfsbane and rowan wood. On top of this, most natural-made werewolves are what we call _Betas_ , who follow the lead of their Alpha. A Beta is bound to their Alpha, compulsed mystically to do what they’re told and to lend their strength. You can see how _any one person_ having such a hold on you would not be something the Army was looking for in a super soldier.”  


“And you’ve found a way around that?” Scott’s mouth almost seemed to be on autopilot, asking questions that would have been otherwise logical or reasonable given the accepted statement that _werewolves are real._  


“Yes.” Fenris leaned in, his entire being seeming to come alight with the topic. There was a sudden intensity to his words and his eyes, a passion that he’d otherwise seemed lacking. “I risked much to smuggle this out of Germany with me. They were working on a serum that would confer the power of an Alpha to a normal human, without the constraints. Their formula was incomplete, but I took it and brought it here to work on it with Talia. I believe we’ve made the breakthrough we need, to give someone like you the advantages of being an Alpha Werewolf without the drawbacks. We only need someone willing to submit to trial.”  


That was him, Scott supposed, the poor sap dumb enough to volunteer for this trial that could probably _kill_ him, that would absolutely _transform_ him at the very best. There were so many questions he should be asking. He should be worried about what happened to him once this transformation was complete, what happened to him if he wanted to _retire_ from the Army. None of those questions actually managed to bubble up out of his chest. They don’t seem to matter in the long run. Scott only needed to know two things to know what his answer was. One, this could potentially allow him to go to Europe and help out a lot of people in need, and two, this was the only chance he had to staying by the side of the one person he had left on earth.  


So he bowed his head a little, settling his seat on the bed and dropping his shoulders as if he were somehow aware of taking an immense weight onto them. “Okay. I’ll do it.”  


Dr. Fenris and Talia Hale exchanged glances, and then Fenris stood, slowly, to put one hand on Scott’s shoulder. “Thank you, son. Thank you. This country could use many more brave men such as yourself.”  


“There are still a couple bigwigs coming in from Washington that haven’t arrived yet.” Talia said, her tone cautionary, as she took a step back out of the doorway. “We will do the procedure first thing in the morning, once they get here. You’ll want to be well-fed and well-rested. We’ll have dinner sent in, you can spent the night in the bunks here. We don’t want you getting into trouble out there in Brooklyn, after all.”  


One hand reached to touch at the now-healed cut on his nose, and Scott almost laughed. He nodded his understanding, lifting his head to brave a smile at both of the scientists. “Okay. Could--could maybe one of you send Sergeant Stilinski in with my dinner?”  


“We can arrange that.” Fenris smiled as he stepped out of the alcove and pulled a privacy screen shut behind them.  


The sigh that worked itself up out of Scott’s lungs, as he turned to lay out flat on the bed he’d been sitting on, felt so mighty and earth-shaking he worried it might be the onset of an asthma attack. It wouldn’t have been the first time he’d had one due to stress, and the cold bite of winter winds always made it worse. He had long ago learned to count small blessings, however, and this was one of them, as the sigh turned out to be nothing more than a sigh. He could afford to close his eyes without feeling like he was drowning on dry land.  


From inside the bunk, the sounds of the rest of the facility seemed muted and far away. Scott couldn’t even hear the city above them at all, and it gave the illusion of having stepped into a completely different world. Maybe he _had_ , at this point Scott wasn’t at all sure, given he was trying to accept into the breadth of his reality that _werewolves were real_ and in the morning, he was going to _become_ one.  


It was probably a mistake. His mind wanted to tell him that it was a mistake, an unnecessary risk that he could let someone else take for him. His heart disagreed vehemently, instead insisting that he should get up out of the bed and demand that the procedure be done as quickly as possible, regardless of the presence of _anybody_ from Washington. It wasn’t the first time that his head and his heart hadn’t agreed. Usually, Scott defaulted to following his heart and let Stiles argue the case for his head if it was too important to be pushed aside. It hadn’t much steered him wrong in the past.  


And Scott had a suspicion that Stiles wasn’t going to urge caution this time.  


He must have drifted off to sleep, because the sound of the privacy curtain being thrown open and Stiles’ voice quietly murmuring ‘thanks’ seemed to come right on the heels of the conviction of having made the right decision. The moment that the smell of food hit his nose, Scott realized just how hungry he was. He made a faint sound of appreciation as he sat up, watching in the dim light as Stiles crossed the small alcove and put a tray down on the one end table that sat between the two bunks. There were two large bowls of what looked like beef stew, a pile of crusty bread stuffed between them, and two glasses of milk. None of the things involved were things he’d seen much of since the rationing started, and Scott was almost certain if he didn’t move fast enough, his stomach was going to leap straight out of his body and wrap itself around the entire tray. He leaned in to help himself to one of the servings as Stiles closed the privacy  curtain again.  


“I’m gonna assume since they let you stay in here that they cleared you for the Project.” Stiles’ voice was cheerful, more optimistic than Scott had heard in weeks. He kept glancing to Scott as he fussed with his own food, trying to check in on Scott’s reactions.  


Most of his current reactions involved stuffing food into his mouth and trying not to sound _too_ obscene over the rich flavor of the stew’s gravy. Still, Scott tried to tuck enough of it into the pouch of one cheek to satisfy Stiles with an answer. “Yeah. I agreed. Tomorrow morning they’re gonna do their procedure and, uh. Try to turn me into a werewolf, I guess. It sounds ridiculous.”  


“It sounds _spectacular_.” Stiles enthused, his eyes alight with excitement. He kept stirring his stew unnecessarily, spoon clattering against the porcelain of the bowl. “It’s gonna work out fine, Scotty. You’re gonna blow their little project out of the water. You’ll see.”  


Scott contemplated his friend as he chewed through his food, watching him fuss with every element of the meal too many times before actually  consuming any of it. He let Stiles get maybe a fourth of the way through his bowl before Scott prompted, in a gentle voice, “Hey. Aren’t I supposed to be the nervous one? I mean, _I’m_ the one who’s going through this great transformation in the morning.”  


The huff Stiles made in response sounded so loud in their little cubby-hole inside the facility. “I--yeah. Yeah. I know. I’m just...you know. What if this works but they decide you’re better off somewhere that I’m not? What if we don’t get deployed to the same area?” There was a fear in his eyes, behind that almost manic giddiness, that he wasn’t voicing. _What if it didn’t work at all_?  


It was at that moment that Scott decided he could not afford to be anything less than utterly convinced that this would work. He was going to take their serum and become the pinnacle of everything the Army deemed a part of _good soldiering_. He couldn’t fail them, because it would mean failing _Stiles_. “Don’t worry about it, buddy. You said it yourself, I’m going to ace it, and _they_ said that I’d need a handler in the field. They already mentioned your name for that job.” It wasn’t _entirely_ a lie. It was just a slight realignment of the truth.  


It made Stiles’ entire face light up, fired from the inside with a hope that was almost alien to his usually-skeptic expression. “Really?”  


“Yeah.” Scott would _make_ it happen, even if they hadn’t meant for it. There was absolutely no way he would allow them to be separated, not when he’s willing to give so much. “Really. It’ll be just like you said, you and me punching Nazis in the face.”  


Mollified, Stiles attacked his food with a refreshed vigor, almost catching up with the pace Scott had set earlier. Scott watched him mop up the last of the stew with his bread, much in the same way Scott had himself. They’d shared moments like this a thousand times. Sometimes they’d been obliged to share the bread, too.  


“Hey, Stiles?”  


Stiles didn’t even look up from his very critical bread-soaking mission. “Yeah, buddy?”  


“You think you could sleep in that other bunk in here tonight?”

  
The fondness that showed in Stiles’ smile as he looked up at Scott’s face seemed familiar, in the way that Scott was sure he knew the flavor of that feeling when he experienced it himself. “Yeah. Definitely.”


	4. Chapter 4

Scott woke up to the scent of eggs and bacon flooding the bunk. Stiles was sitting up on his bed already, half-dressed with his uniform jacket undone over his undershirt. The tray that had held their stew the night before seemed to have been replaced with one that boasted toast, a few precious strips of bacon, a small bowl of oatmeal and fried eggs. Stiles was chewing slowly through one of his pieces of bacon, which didn’t surprise Scott in the least. He was pretty sure he’d _never_ caught Stiles keeping kosher.  


He grinned at Scott with a piece of crisped bacon caught between his front teeth. “You about ready for your big day, Scotty? Fenris says you gotta eat everything. You’re apparently going to use a lot of energy today.”  


Somehow, just having Stiles with him made this more of an adventure than a terrifying experiment. Scott wasn’t sure how much of Stiles’ enthusiasm was genuine and how much was an act to keep Scott on track, but Scott was grateful for it in any case. He chuckled as he reached for his plate, using his fork to break the yolks of his eggs so that he could soak them up with the toast. “As ready as I’m ever gonna be, I think. I don’t know how else you’re supposed to prepare for something like this. I’m not even sure what it’s going to do to me.”  


“Turn you into a werewolf. An _Alpha_.” Stiles volunteered helpfully, as if that was all the explanation that Scott should need.  


“Yeah, or some kind of horrible rage-filled monster that can’t keep from mutilating everything around it as it suffers to exist.”  


Stiles’ chewing slowed, skepticism painting over the worry buried deeper in his expression. “Well, _that’s_ a depressing way of looking at it.”  


He stood, moving to sit next to Scott on his bunk with his oatmeal in his hand. Stiles let their legs press together from the hip down, a familiar kind of closeness, and elbowed Scott amicably in the ribs. “You’re not gonna turn into a rage-filled monster. That’s why they’re doing this to _you_ and not _me_. You’re still gonna be Scotty on the other side of this. You’ll just be Scotty with some new abilities.”  


The old nickname helped settle something in Scott, and he answered that elbow with an elbow of his own, smiling faintly. The rest of their breakfast passed in companionable silence, Scott’s nerves soothed by the presence of his closest friend. By the time he’d finished all of the food he’d been instructed he _had to finish_ , he’d even stop trembling, feeling less like he was on the verge of an asthma attack brought on by sheer stress. Naturally, the feeling of being _settled_ didn’t last.  


Instead, almost as if she’d somehow known that they’d finished their meal and without announcing herself in the least, Talia pushed down the privacy curtain of the bunk’s alcove and fixed her gaze on Scott. It was as if Stiles wasn’t even there, as inconsequential to her purposes as the furniture in the room. “Good morning, Mr. McCall. I trust you’re well rested?”  


Scott let his eyes flick towards Stiles before looking back to Talia, trying to muster up a smile. “Good morning, Ms. Hale. I slept pretty well. I have to admit I’m kind of nervous, though.”  


Talia’s smile was indulgent. “I think that’s reasonable. If you’re finished with your breakfast, we’d like to get started as soon as possible?”  


It wasn’t really a _request_ or a _suggestion_ , no matter how much it had sounded like a question. Scott wasn’t sure if he was passing the point of no return here, or if he’d already done so. Either way, he supposed it didn’t matter. He was moving forward. Always, he was moving forward.  


“I’m ready.” He tried to sound more confident than he felt, putting one hand on Stiles’ shoulder to use it to push himself standing. “You’re not going anywhere, right?”  


There was something watery and nervous about the edges of Stiles’ smile, but they both pretended like they didn’t know it was there. It was better that way. “Right. I’ll be right here.”  


“Mr. McCall.” Talia prompted, sounding less patient than she had a moment ago.  


Scott nodded and turned to follow Talia out of the alcove, trying to keep the image of Stiles’ upturned, hopeful face fixed in his mind. It didn’t particularly stop the itching, nervous discomfort in his lungs but it _helped_ , took just the barest edge off to know that no matter how much the rest of the facility might have been thinking of him as a tool to be used and forged to a certain end, there was still someone who was in his corner for Scott’s own sake.  


He had to make this work, if only because Scott refused to give that up.  


He followed Talia out of the dorm area of the facility and back into that enormous room he’d seen the day before. On his previous trip, that room had almost seemed like a ghost town, full of quietly whirring machinery without anyone attending to it. This morning, it was a glut of activity to rival any successful beehive, people in labcoats and army uniforms darting back and forth. The glass windows of the observation room had been cleaned to a careful shine, making it easy to see the solemn faces of the decorated soldiers and the men in business suits that sat behind them. They all had the hard, closed-off look of men who had made decisions that would haunt them for the rest of their days, and Scott found himself hoping fervently that he wasn’t going to become just another line on those faces.  


In the center of the room, the chamber had been opened up to reveal something that looked like it might have been a torture device invented in the 1300s. There was a flat surface in the center, currently tipped at an angle, that was roughly shaped and sized like a tall, muscular man. It had more straps on it than Scott could really make sense of in one glance, ones made out of thick, heavy leather and equally thick, heavy steel. He made a quiet, worried sound without meaning to, only to feel Talia’s hand come down heavily on his shoulder.  


“Don’t worry.” She said, her tone one of almost artificial cheerfulness. “It’s not nearly as bad as it looks. I think. Those straps are just a security measure.”  


“Security for me, or security for the rest of you?” Scott could barely drag his eyes away from the chamber to look into those inscrutable eyes of Talia Hale.

 

“Yes.”  


That wasn’t reassuring.  


Stiles appeared at the edge of the observation room, out of place in his enlisted man’s uniform in a room full of generals. Scott lifted a smile meant just for him before he became aware of Doctor Fenris hovering at his left elbow. “Mr. McCall, if you would step into the chamber, we can get the procedure started?”  


It wasn’t like he’d have been able to leave the room even if he’d wanted, at this point. Every door was guarded by heavily armed men who seemed far more aware and alert than they had the day before. He wouldn’t get far. Still moving forward.  


With a nod, Scott moved as Fenris directed him to. He was stripped of his shirt and pants, left in his underwear and with no real time to feel ashamed before he was pressed back against the cold metal of the support. Talia and Dr. Fenris worked to strap him down against it, making the bindings tight enough to teeter on the borderline of uncomfortable. Before he could really make a noise of protest, Fenris made a sympathetic grimace and patted at Scott’s shoulder. “Just to be sure, Mr. McCall. Just to be safe. We’re going to close the chamber now. Please try to relax. We’ll be administering the shot soon.”  


Given no other chance to speak or even protest, Fenris swung the door on the chamber shut, and Scott was swallowed up by solitude. He could see nothing but the seven square inches that peeked through the observation portal in the door of the chamber.  When they tipped the chamber back so that Scott was more laying back than he was standing up, that meant he could see a very fascinating seven square inches of ceiling, which made him wonder in some sense why that window was there at all.  


He could hear Talia’s voice muffled through the chamber, but he couldn’t make out any of the worst she was saying, just the strident, almost grandstanding tone she was saying it with. It felt like being underwater, or maybe buried beneath the floorboards, and every breath came after more effort than the last the more he allowed himself to think about that.  


Just about the time he felt like he couldn’t stand it any more and the pressure was turning into a legitimate asthma attack, Scott felt an abrupt spear of pain in his side, and _everything changed_.  


It felt like they were injecting _pure fire_ into his veins. No--that wasn’t quite right. Fire didn’t have this sudden weight and depth to it, this was more like molten steel, flowing into his body like an endless river. It seared through every vein, wrapped around his spine, scorched its way up through his marrow and set his brain alight. It dug in deep to the core of him and twisted, reforging its way from the inside out. Noise roared in his ears, all of the noise in the _world_ all at once, too many thundering, hammering sounds and someone screaming in a low, wounded bellow like an angry bull. His body bucked up against the restraints, straining until he was sure he was going to bruise, desperate to escape this feeling of being forged on Hephaestus’ anvil.  


There was no escape.  


There was only _moving forward_.  


Slowly, the pain began to ebb. Scott had no way of knowing how much time had passed, but gradually, like surfacing up from a pool of scalding water, he began to be able to make sense of the chaos.  


Everything that seemed so distant and muffled was now absolutely, crystalline clear. He could hear through the chamber as if it wasn’t there at all, the voices of Talia and Fenris and the military brass shouting in mass confusion. Beyond that, he could hear the sound of the city beyond them, tires on snowy streets and shoes on pavement. He could smell more things than he thought there existed to be smelled, a confusing mess that somehow translated in his mind as fear, anger, desperation, concern.  


Layered under all of it like the mystery he’d been trying to find his entire life was a smell that was frustratingly familiar, a rhythmic sound that Scott wanted to wrap around himself and suffuse into his bones to chase away the ache of _becoming_.  


He found his voice eventually, shuffling it around in his mouth until he could rasp out, “...I’m okay. I’m okay. You can--you can open the door. I’m fine.”  


Through the door, Scott could hear Talia’s voice, reverent and excited. “...he survived. He’s _not_ my Beta.”  


Then, as the chamber was slowly tipped back upright, Stiles, sounding pitchy and edged with nerves. “Can we just get him _out_ of there and celebrate about your incredible science ability later?”  


The latches on the chamber door were loud enough to make Scott wince as they popped free. The door screeched open with an even louder clatter, and as it went Scott thought he caught a glimpse of heavy denting on the inside of the door. Everything was a little smaller, he thought, but as the faces started to lean in and he saw Stiles’ widened eyes scraping up and down the line of his body, Scott realized the truth.  


Nothing was smaller. _He_ was bigger.  


Despite the restraints, he managed to look down at himself and couldn’t repress the reflexive gasp. Scott was sure he was several inches taller than he had been, closer to Stiles’ height now. He had _muscles_ , a _lot_ of them, way more muscles than he’d ever had in the past, more muscles than he’d really been aware a person could have. Even at rest, even restrained, he felt like he could feel the new power thrumming under his skin, waiting for the smallest excuse to be released. Scott could understand how this could be dangerous for some men, but he wasn’t scared.  


How _could_ he be scared, with Stiles looking at him like that? Those long fingers reaching like he really wanted to just touch Scott’s skin and assure himself that the changes were real. He didn’t. At the very last moment, his hands redirected and then Stiles was the first to start undoing the straps holding him down.  


Doctor Fenris’ face swung into Scott’s view, eyes bright. Scott thought he might be about to cry, but he also thought that was more from an overwhelmed excitement than sadness. “How do you feel, Mr. McCall?”

  
Scott opened his mouth to answer on a deafening loud _crack_ , and that’s when the red blossomed in the center of Fenris’ forehead and he crumpled to the floor.


	5. Chapter 5

Panic surged through his body and Scott lurched forward, snapping free of the remaining restraints in an attempt to move fast enough to catch Fenris’ body as it fell. He _wasn’t_ fast enough, which resulted in Scott crouched on the floor of the room while chaos exploded into reign around him.  


A man stood by the door that lead out to the street, gun drawn. In the other hand, he held the case with the serum vials in it, clutching it in front of his body like he thought it would keep anyone from firing on him. He seemed to be right, because the first guard who stepped up to stop the gunman hesitated just long enough to take a second bullet straight through the eyes.  


The thunder of it echoed too-loud in Scott’s skull long enough for the gunman to take off down the tunnel that lead to the street entrance.  


He finally shook himself out of the dazed reverie at the touch of Stiles’ hand on his elbow, his face as wildly intent as his voice as he gave the instruction, “Go get ‘im, Scotty.”  


After that, it was almost like the _only thing_ Scott wanted to do in the _entire world_ was chase down this man.  


With no mind to how little he was wearing, Scott lept into a sprint, stretching out his limbs to their utter limit. For the first time in his entire _life_ , his body didn’t rebel. Instead, it seemed to sing with the effort, his lungs moving easily and efficiently to supply him with all the oxygen he could want, his heart pumping soundly in his chest to keep his blood moving to every extremity. The idea of running wasn’t a death sentence even when confronted with the cold winter air. It was liberation, glorious and beautiful, like it was just what Scott had been made to do.  


He kind of wanted to run _forever_ , arms pistoning at his sides, feet pounding down on the pavement.  


Scott shook himself out of his head as he emerged from the mess the gunman had left in the pawn shop front and onto the Brooklyn street. He had a job to do. He could go running for the sheer thrill of it later. Right now, he had to catch that thief.  


That _murderer_.  


His senses felt as if they had expanded, too. The patterns of the people around him laid out like trails, tinted over with a film of red, like phantom images of every place a person had walked or touched in the past few moments. Scott sorted through them until he found the trail that reeked of fear and desperation, and with that held in the front of his mind like a beacon, he ran.  


Vaguely, Scott was aware of the sound of people objecting, scandalized as he sped past them on the hunt. Vaguely, he was aware of how _fast_ he was running, far faster than he should be able to. There were a lot of things that Scott was vaguely aware of, but he ignored them in favor of the hunt and the rightness of the feeling of pushing his body to previously unachievable limits.  


The gunman led Scott down twisting streets and doublebacks, across the winter-touched landscape of Brooklyn until they finally burst into a berth at the very end of the Naval yard, to the shouts and protests of the men and women working there. Someone fired a gun, but Scott had no time or space to figure out who or where. He just kept running, the relatively open space giving him the opportunity to increase his speed and begin to really close the distance.  


Another gunshot that registered as little more than a flash of pain in his left leg.  


The gunman still had just enough distance on Scott, mostly gained by the erratic rabbit turns he’d made in his flight, that he reached the water before Scott did. Without any hesitation, he turned and dove straight in.  


Scott gave a legitimate _snarl_ , determined not to lose this man’s trail. He wouldn’t be able to follow through water, so it was absolutely imperative that he catch the gunman _right now_. He didn’t let himself hesitate, either. He bunched both of his legs up, dipping close to the ground for one or two strides, and then _leapt_.  


The jump took Scott far past where he would have landed yesterday, even without the several city blocks of hard running. It took him far past where he should have landed by any reasonable rights, right past the end of the dock and out over the water. He had just started to brace himself for the idea of the ice-cold water when some kind of submersible boat surfaced, water sloughing off of its glass canopy. Scott hit the wet glass and skidded, his thigh burning with pain and his fingers and toes screeching against the surface for purchase. Looking down at the craft, for a split instant, Scott caught the image of his own reflection and his breath caught in his throat.  


There was something wrong with his features, his nose too flattened and caught in a permanent snarl near his eyes. His eyebrows were too shaggy, as was all the hair on his head, growing down his cheeks and jawline in sideburns he had definitely not had when he woke up. His ears had pointed, but most striking was the way his eyes were _glowing red_.  


Inside the submersible, the gunman moved abruptly, knocking Scott out of his shock. He could feel the fangs that had dropped down out of his gums when he bared them, lifting one hand--he had _claws_ , too, it turned out--to slam it into the glass canopy beneath him.  


The glass spiderwebbed and man who had murdered Dr. Fenris blanched beneath it.  


Another hit and Scott had so badly broken the window that water was leaking in from several points. A third, and Scott’s hand burst through entirely, allowing him to reach in and grab a handful of the gunman’s shirt collar. With his grip so tight as to be unrelenting, Scott gathered his strength against the now-floundering submersible and jumped a second time.  


By the time they hit the ground, the gunman was laughing, an ugly sound with too much grit rasping around its edges .He jeered up at Scott, unconcerned by the instinctive way that Scott bared his fangs in response. “Such a good lapdog. Bark, bark! Oh, but puppy should get his leg looked at, don’t want it to _fester_ , no?”  


Scott’s head was already swimming, making it hard for him to place where the man’s accent came from. Germany? No, something wasn’t quite right for it. He shifted his grip to the gunman’s throat and tried not to look at the place on his leg where he’d been shot. He could _just_ see it out of the corner of his eyes and whatever black net was working out from the wound, tracing the path of his veins, did _not_ look good. It itched. It _burned_.  


“Why did you do it! Tell me! Who were you taking the serum to?” Scott wasn’t sure what questions were the right ones, only that he needed to be asking _something_ , figuring out some kind of puzzle that was just beyond his reach. The swimming was quickly turning to pounding and Scott was beginning to wish that Stiles was there to take over the questioning. Stiles had always seemed to have a better mind for this kind of thing. Most of Scott just wanted to hold this guy by the collar and rattle his brain around inside his skull.  


It wasn’t helped by the fact that the man wouldn’t stop laughing that sincerely ugly laugh. He reached up from his place on the ground, gripping the back of Scott’s neck with a cold, clammy hand, and hissed his words through clenched teeth and a tight jaw. “ _La flèche d'argent vole vrai_!”  


An acrid, terrible smell filled the air, so repellent that Scott had let go of the gunman and taken several steps backwards before he even realized he was moving. As it turned out, he needn’t have worried about his target getting away. The man lay on the concrete of the dock and convulsed violently, blood-flecked foam boiling out of the lips he’d caught up in a rictus grin. In what felt like far too few moments, the gunman was dead.

  
Swallowing bile, Scott took a forward, determined to pick up the body and carry it back to the hidden bunker. He got two steps into the task before the pain in his leg suddenly exploded outwards, seeming to engulf his body. His knee buckled, but that didn’t matter either, because Scott was unconscious before he hit the dock.


	6. Chapter 6

Scott woke laying on his back on one of the beds in the facility, Stiles’ face hovering over his own with a pinched, unhappy expression.  


The moment he had blinked himself entirely awake, Stiles relaxed, his shoulders dropping and head hanging on his neck in such a way that for just a moment, he looked like he’d shed himself of the weight of an entire country. That relief didn’t last for long at all, before Stiles pulled the mask of his nonchalance back down over his features and smiled, half-pushing Scott’s prone shoulder with one hand. “Don’t _scare_ me like that.”  


Casting back in his memory, the last thing that Scott could find was being on the docks of the Naval Yard. He frowned up at Stiles’ face, eyebrows furrowed. “What happened?”  


“You got shot. Which normally wouldn’t be a problem, except that the guy who shot you was using aconite bullets.” Stiles rocked backwards out of Scott’s range of vision, and Scott could feel the pressure of his hand pass over his leg, just above the knee, just _below_ where he’d been shot. “Which, by the way, is _wolfsbane_. Normal bullets wouldn’t really be a problem. Your body should heal those so fast it pushes the bullets back out before they can cause you too much trouble. But wolfsbane is different. It’s basically poison, even to werewolves. It could have been fatal if you hadn’t been treated in time, even that tiny amount.”  


Something cold ran down his spine at the thought. He hadn’t even really considered the possibility. Scott had been so focused on the chase and the prospect of catching the villain that he hadn’t thought of his own safety. Groaning quietly, he started to push himself up to sit at the head of the bed. A bit to Scott’s surprise, Stiles didn’t do anything to prevent that.  


Scott determined moments later this was because the injury on his leg was completely gone, down to any lingering soreness. It was as if it had never been there. Scott frowned, pressing his fingers against the skin of his thigh and finding it give as much resistance as it ever had. “So why aren’t I dead?”  


“That’s because you’ve got _me_ , big guy.” Stiles was grinning, like he’d never felt worried or stressed about the situation. He gave Scott a wink, even, that seemed so out of place, but also that stirred something familiar in Scott’s chest. It was nice. Everything else seemed to be changing so fast. “I did a lot of learning and research before we started this experiment. It’s why you have a handler. So I can give you the antidote and make sure you don’t die of wolfsbane poisoning or something dumb and preventable like that.”  


“That’s not the _only_ reason I have you.” Scott scolded fondly, which earned him another little shove to his shoulder.  


Something passed over Stiles’ face that Scott couldn’t really identify. It was amplified by a new, strange scent that Scott _also_ couldn’t identify. He had no time to dwell on either of these things, because immediately Stiles was turning his face to the side and standing up, still wearing that strange expression. “Come on, big guy. Talia wants to talk to you about your field kit, and then I guess we get our orders.”  


_Orders_. The notion of those was more than enough to take Scott’s mind off of the look on Stiles’ face. It was almost as if he hadn’t considered this commitment through, and now that he was here on the other side of it, he was realizing that he was going to have to actually go to war., He was going to have to _wage_ war, as some kind of highly-specialized weapon.  


Scott sucked a deep breath in, gathering his resolve, and rose to his feet. Always moving forward. He had to be always moving forward. He could do this, with Stiles’ help. There was never any going back. He smoothed his hands down his rumpled front, feeling the muscles under his shirt and skin that he’d never been aware he’d even had. It was like living in somebody else’s body, like wearing a costume that he couldn’t take off. Even his hands seemed different, like they were broader-palmed and more sturdy.  


At least Stiles was the same as he’d always been, although the angles had changed in the way he slung one arm easily over Scott’s now-broad shoulders and tugged him into half a hug. “We’re gonna be fine, Scotty, don’t worry. Let’s just get you your fancy outfit so I don’t have to spend my lunch hour digging wolfsbane tar out of your leg again, okay?”  


It was still easy to allow Stiles to steer him through the bunker, still easy to let Stiles take the lead. As they made their way through twisting tunnels beneath the Brooklyn, Scott let himself wonder how long that would last, or if that too would change, like the balance and the weight of the rest of his life and even their relationship was shifting. For now, he could have this last semblance of normality, following Stiles through yet another set of heavily guarded doors and into a large space, carefully carved up by partial dividers, glass panels, and tables and tables covered in things that Scott could describe with no more detail than the word ‘gadgets’.  


Talia stood by one of those tables, a swatch of dark blue cloth held in her hands. Her expression was thoughtful, fingers curled up in the sides of it as she pulled at it experimentally. The fabric stretched under the pressure of her pulling but it never gave, and that seemed to be a good reaction as far as Talia was concerned, because she smiled, nodding to herself, and looked up as if noticing that Scott and Stiles had entered for the first time. “There you are. Feeling better after your encounter with the wolfsbane?”  


“I feel fine.” Scott looked back down at his leg again, as if he could see the place where he’d been wounded beneath the khaki of his uniform pants. “Like I was never shot. I guess that means the antidote worked.”  


Flicking a brief, evaluatory look to Stiles, Talia settled her gaze back on Scott with a brief nod. “Yes. But ideally, you wouldn’t even need the antidote. That’s what we’re going to work on here. The first step is your uniform.”  


Talia held the cloth up, then, and with a good shake it resolved itself into bodysuit that seemed, at first glance, like it could be big enough for Scott’s new, improved frame to fit into.  


It was just a little bit ridiculous, a bright blue backdrop with equally bright white-and-red markings on the chest and arms. There was a star in the exact center of the chest, and Scott had a sudden and almost overwhelming desire to reach out and touch it. “...Isn’t this a little impractical for a battlefield uniform?”  


With a little chuckle, Talia stretched out one arm and offered the suit to Scott. It was softer than it seemed it should be, when he took it in his hands, but it also seemed far more sturdy than he could account for given how light it was. “If you were a traditional soldier, certainly.” She agreed, watching with a critical air gathered around her as Scott examined the outfit. “But you’re not. You don’t have to worry about what a traditional soldier has to worry about. You are in part there to keep them from having to worry about it. You can survive assaults that they cannot, so if you make yourself the most obvious target on the field, there is a higher likelihood that more troops _will_ survive.”  


Something twisted, just a little, in Scott’s gut. He wanted to point out that even if he did heal as quickly as everyone was claiming he would, he still felt the _pain_. Something told him that admission was going to mean little to nothing to Talia Hale, so he kept it to himself. “So this isn’t armor, this is a target.”  


“It’s _both_.” Talia chided, like she was speaking to a child. “This is state-of-the-art technology. It won’t stop a high-caliber bullet or a bullet fired from close range, but it will turn almost every blade and help protect you from blunt force trauma.”  


“So this isn’t going to do anything about those wolfsbane bullets, is it?” Scott frowned, unable to really tear his eyes away from the proud star in the middle of the uniform.  


That was, until the room was suddenly filled with a cacophony of rattling and crashing that seemed to take up all of the leftover space. It bounced off of the insides of Scott’s skull, ringing back and forth, and he found himself reaching up to cover his ears on reflex, flinching away from where he _thought_ the sound was coming from.  


There was Stiles, somehow looking like a child dressed up in an Army uniform, both of his arms raised up over the level of his shoulders as if to try claim he’d had nothing to do with the sound, a stance which immediately condemned him. At his feet was a metallic dish, slowly running around its edge as it settled down onto the ground in the same way a dropped plate or hubcap might waste its momentum away. The moment he realized that Scott and Talia were both looking at him, Stiles darted his eyes up from the thing on the ground, mouth pursed and eyebrows high on his forehead. It was an expression that he’d shown to Scott a hundred times or more over the years, one that all but universally meant _save me from this awkward social situation I have put myself in_.  


“We have a solution for that problem, too.” Talia said, seeming pleased with herself. She gestured to the metal thing on the ground with one hand extended, palm up. “Sergeant Stilinski, if you’d pick it up, please?”  


With the barest hint of hesitation, Stiles leaned down to pick the metal circle up, turning it so that the peak of its convex surface was pointed towards Talia. He barely had it all the way up when Talia raised her other hand from the shoulder, a snubnosed pistol fit firmly in her grip. Scott lurched forward, but his new body felt too heavy, too sluggish with shock.  


Stiles made a sound of fear and instinctively ducked down behind the metal, angling it to cover his head and torso as best he could manage. The gun barked three times before Scott had closed the distance between himself and Talia, wrapping one hand around the entire firearm. He crushed it between his fingers in a burst of inhuman strength. His eyes burned red as they locked onto Talia’s face, lips peeling back to show the fangs that had dropped down from his gums.  


Talia didn’t flinch, although her own eyes flashed red in response. Instead, she looked past Scott to Stiles, and Scott followed her gaze to see the near-terrified but unharmed eyes of his best friend peering over the upper edge of the shield. That’s what it was, his mind belatedly supplied. A _shield_.  


“The shield is made from vibranium, the same metal that’s been worked into the suit in a mesh. Remarkable stuff, really. It absorbs ninety percent of the energy from almost any impact.” Talia released the ruined gun to Scott’s grasp and took a few steps forward, ignoring how Stiles scuttled back like a spooked crab. She knelt, reaching to the floor to pick up the misshapen lumps that had been her bullets before they hit the shield. “That makes it _nearly_ indestructible. The shield can stop what the weave mesh in the uniform can’t. You’ll be as safe as you can be, on a battlefield.”  


“Why can’t you just make all the army uniforms out of that mesh stuff if it’s good enough to stop most bullets?” Stiles asked, still hiding behind the shield like Talia was going to pull another gun out of nowhere and fire on him a second time. Scott couldn’t honestly blame his caution.  


She didn’t. Instead, she shook her head, looking more sad than anything else. “There isn’t enough of it. It’s incredibly rare. Between the suit and the shield we’ve used all of the vibranium we had access to.”  


Scott let go of the pieces of Talia’s gun, trying to rein himself in so that it was his human face that he turned to Stiles as he reached for the shield. He pried his best friend out from behind it, careful to keep the bulk of his body between Talia and Stiles. “Come on. I’m sure we’ve taken up enough of Mrs. Hale’s time.”  


A petulant expression came over Stiles’ face, but it was for Talia, not Scott. He gave the shield a little toss, letting it clatter back to the floor again, dark eyes leveled over Scott’s shoulder at Talia like a promise of anger that was only being restrained due to Scott’s presence.  


“You’re more than just a literal shield for them, you know,” Talia spoke quietly, and only when Scott and Stiles had gotten several feet away from her towards the door. “You’re a metaphorical shield too. A symbol. This is bigger than you, Scott. Bigger than _Scott McCall_. I hope you realize that. It doesn’t matter what you wear or what you carry. People are going to look at you and they’re going to see the whole country.”  


The words tasted sour as Scott breathed them in, and he found himself closing his eyes briefly, face turned away from Talia. Stiles’ hand fell to one of his shoulders and squeezed, rallying the strength up from the pits of Scott’s body. Without turning to face Talia, Scott gave a slow nod. “Good. That’s fine. That’s what I’ll be, then. _Captain America_.”

  
They strode from the room together without looking back.


	7. Chapter 7

The vibrations of the airplane in flight rattled up through the metal of its frame and straight into Scott’s skull. It felt like it was occupying his enter skeleton, overtaking him until there was nothing but the frequency he vibrated at and the loud low drone of the propellers he could hear outside of the cabin. It was nice, in a way, the ability to disconnect from what his reality had become, even for a few moments. The way the trundling hum dulled his scalpel-sharp senses so that he could lose himself in his head instead.  


Scott had known that war would change them both as much as the serum had changed him, but it was still a shock, sometimes, how desensitized they’d gotten to everything, how almost _everyday_ it was all becoming. Time had this way of twisting and distorting, until it was hard to remember that there had ever been a time before the War, or that there might ever be a time where it had ended.  


They’d been deployed for a little over two months, now. They were constantly on the move, moreso than normal troops, being airlifted out by daring pilots in bullet-riddled planes and dropped in again where they were most needed. They performed precision strikes against the enemy, crippling their logistics or liberating assets as needed before moving on to the next target, and slowly they’d been cutting their way across the front lines, carving a swath through France and starting to dig deeper in a way that Command was hoping would allow them to open up the French countryside like a zipper and push the Nazis back towards Germany. It had been constant fighting, or moving to the next place of fighting, with just enough time for Scott to stop and dig the bullets out of his bones.  


Little time for _sleeping_ , which was what Stiles was doing on the other side of the plane’s cabin. Stiles had recently developed the ability to sleep anywhere, and largely without warning, a talent that Scott had spent too many sleepless nights being jealous of. Curled up under the rough wool of a field blanket, Stiles looked far too young to have been pulled into a conflict like this, his skin too pale and his exhaustion showing in dark smudges that dominated the bottom orbit of his eyes. Scott supposed there were a countless number of young men in just this state, on both sides of the conflict. He also supposed it was his job to make sure as many of them survived to see the end of it as possible.  


That was what this newest mission, like all missions, seemed to be about. Somewhere in the heart of France, a faction of Nazi sympathizers who called themselves _Argent_ had established a stronghold. No one was quite sure what went on within the stronghold, except that prisoners of war seemed to be shipped in from time to time, and none ever seemed to come back out, alive or otherwise. That information had been enough to chill Scott’s bones, given the all too-vivid memory of the words that the man who had murdered Dr. Fenris had spat at Scott as he died, but of course that information wasn’t all of it by far.  


One of the Army’s most effective and highly-trained squadrons had been captured mid-mission and taken into the Argent fortress. The so-called Howling Commandos possessed amongst them enough information to blow a hole in the side of the American offensive several miles wide, so thus it had become the special mission of _Captain America_ and his faithful sidekick Lt. Stilinski to infiltrate the Argent stronghold and free the squadron. Stiles had argued with Command until he was almost literally blue in the face about how _this was a terrible idea_ and _those men should have been trained to withstand this kind of treatment_ and _how were the two of them supposed to bust out an entire squadron_ but all it had really taken was one of Scott’s hands on the inside of an elbow and all of Stiles’ objections had faded away.  


They both knew the truth. Scott couldn’t, in good conscience, leave anybody in that facility now that he knew it existed, and Stiles couldn’t, in whatever kind of conscience _he_ had, let Scott try to do it alone.  


They did almost nothing alone, any more, each burdened with the sole responsibility of keeping the other alive. In that respect, nothing had really changed. Scott was grateful for that, in this world where everything else was so unrecognizable as a world he’d once known.  


He and Stiles had also gotten used to sharing tight quarters, cramming into spaces that should have only been large enough for one of them. It had become so familiar that Scott had started to feel like the other side of a plane cabin was, itself, too far away from the scent and the slow-rhythm sound of Stiles’ sleeping heart that Scott could use to settle himself, if he dug it up from under the noise of the airplane. With a lurch, Scott pushed himself across the small aisle to the place where Stiles slept, tucking himself into the lee of Stiles’ body like had done on occasion when there was a lot less of Scott and a lot more of that lee. He shifted through the smells of machine grease and gun oil and mildewed wool to find the rich, pine-earthy smell of Stiles beneath and from there, sleep was easy.  


Scott woke again when the plane made a rough landing on a temporary runway somewhere deep in rural France. He wasn’t really sure whether it was the turbulence and shuddering the craft was doing on the way down that had woken him, or the solid (and accidental) smack in the head he’d gotten from Stiles as his friend startled awake. He steadied Stiles with both hands either way, until Stiles had enough control of himself to prevent bouncing all around the cabin like a loose bean.  By the time they made it to the ground, they had both gathered all of their gear, although Stiles was still rubbing at one eye with the knuckles of that hand like he could have stayed asleep for a lot longer if anyone had _let_ him.  


There were barely enough tents huddled near the end of the supposed runway to qualify as a camp. Scott was almost certain that they had been thrown up at the last minute to accommodate their arrival. Hunching his shoulders against the brisk wind, Scott readjusted the shield on his back and started to follow the liaison that had met them into the command tent. Somewhere in the distance he could hear the bumblebee drone of another plane, this one the wrong pitch to belong to any of the Allied forces, and he pressed his mouth into a thin line, hoping that whatever Axis force was out there trolling the skies would miss this little gathering.  


After all, surviving gunfire was one thing. Surviving a direct bombing seemed like another one entirely.  


Like everything else at this airfield, the command tent was unimpressive, being held up on at least one side by the Jeep parked on the other side of the canvas. Spread out on an unstable table in the center of the tent was a map, overlaid in places by grainy aerial photographs. Their commanding officer leaned over all of this on one side of the table, his expression grim. He looked up as they entered, nodding to himself as if they were the answer to some kind of question that hadn’t been voiced. “Good. You’re here.”  


There would be no time to rest, no chance for a warm meal. Those had all been used up on the plane. There would only be the plan and then its execution. Scott took up the side of the table directly opposite their command and felt as much as he saw Stiles come to stand on his right.  


“This is the Argent fortress that holds the Howling Commandos.” The officer explained, reaching down to put a marker on the map. “It is heavily reinforced against a ground assault, with what appear to be small tanks in the courtyard here. A direct approach would be suicide, even for a soldier of your caliber.”  


Scott frowned, looking at the images on the table. Some of them were too grainy to make much sense out of, but he could see the tanks in one of them, half a dozen of them or so. There was no way to know if they were actually functional, but they couldn’t afford to assume they weren’t. “If we can’t approach from ground, what’s our vector, then?”  


Flicking his gaze up first to Scott and then to Stiles, the officer, then glances back towards the airstrip. “By air. The fortress backs into the hill, which they thought would make it inaccessible. Maybe with their traditional planes, it would be. But we have a Hale prototype that--”  


“Whoa,” Stiles interrupted, one hand lifting into the air. “Did you say _Hale_?”  


“He sure did, boys.” Purred a familiar voice from the entrance flap of the tent. Scott looked up from the photographs on the table to see Talia Hale shadowing the entrance. Her smile was appropriately wolfish, sharp on the edges where it tugged into her face. “We’re gonna fly you right over that little hideout of theirs and drop you straight into the heart of it.”  


Stiles grunted at Scott’s side, his scowl something that could be felt in the small space. “Yeah? And _then_ what do you expect to happen?”

  
Somehow, Talia’s smile only grew more sharp. “You’re going to tear your way out from the inside.”


	8. Chapter 8

As it turned out, the Hale prototype was a helicopter that Talia assured them would be much quieter than the other helicopters that were just beginning to be fielded in the war, and--perhaps more importantly--it would be far less detectable on the Nazis’ radar. It looked like it had been hobbled together with pieces of scrap metal that had been lying around the airfield before Scott and Stiles arrived. Scott was fairly certain he could see at least one place where the Axis symbol had been hastily painted over. The more Stiles looked at the thing, the more he went pale, like he was going to be sick if he had to contemplate traveling in it any longer.  


Scott understood the distaste, but it was all that they had. There was no point in making a fuss about it.  


Instead, he and Stiles spent the better part of an hour trying to settle each other’s nerves by means of checking their gear, repacking parachutes and cleaning rifles. It had become routine for them, a way to reconnect and reassure each other that even if they didn’t feel like they had anything under control, at least they had each other in the middle of the chaos.  


Scott was sure he wouldn’t have been able to handle any of this _without_ Stiles.  


He was especially sure of that when the pair of them found themselves, less than two hours later, dangling precariously off of the skids of the helicopter, hovering above an intimidatingly large and well-reinforced Argent stronghold. The only thing that kept Scott’s heart from beating entirely out of his chest, from the fear making it impossible to keep his grip, was the fact that he could look to his side and see Stiles’ pale face just as terrified as he was.  


The countdown was silent, something no one on the outside would have recognized as what it was. That didn’t matter. What mattered was that once it was over, Scott let go of the skids and began to freefall through the dark, damp French air, knowing Stiles was just seconds behind him.  


They tore through the cloud cover and deployed their chutes at the last possible moment to avoid being spotted. Scott hit the target of one of the fortresses’ ramparts, near the hill, almost exactly, jogging a few feet to kill momentum while he worked himself out of the chute harness. The sound of Stiles hitting the stones behind him seemed painfully loud to Scott’s ears, but turning proved only that Stiles was in the middle of rolling up to his feet, struggling to free his left arm from the chute. “‘m fine, I’m fine, let’s go.”  


Scott gathered up their chutes by the strings as best he could, dragging them along the rampart until he could find a place where they would be out of sight. He was well aware that by the time the sun came up, they’d be obvious, but at that point it wouldn’t matter. Either they would have succeeded in their jailbreak or they’d be dead. Parachutes would be the least of their worries.  


As they entered the base, Scott took point, Stiles covering his back with his rifle already in hand and ready. Stiles had memorized their path down to the holding cells in remarkable time, calling the turns to Scott as they scuttlecrabbed forward through the dark halls of the fortress. The first time they rounded the corner to encounter an Argent agent, Scott moved like liquid lightning, surging up with his weight behind his shoulder and his shoulder behind his shield. He slammed into the man’s face hard enough for there to be a sickening _crack_ and a smear of blood left behind. The Argent was unconscious before he hit the ground, and stripped of his weaponry only moments later.  


Their luck held for two more encounters. They were two thirds of the way to the holding cells, having kept mostly to disused corridors and old servants’ passageways, when it broke spectacularly.  


There were _four_ men in the patrol that they next encountered, and for one brittle second, they all seemed to stand there and stare at each other. The next second, the Argents opened fire and Stiles ducked down behind Scott for shelter.  


Half-crouched, Scott lashed out at the knees of the lead guard during the first break in gunfire. The edge of his shield bit into the joint and Scott gave the whole thing a twist as he pulled it back. The man gave an ugly scream as his knee popped apart, collapsing towards his injured leg. Scott recovered his shield in enough time to bash it into the guard’s face on the way down.  


Stiles was less gentle. His rifle barked in short bursts over Scott’s head, the rounds catching the second guard in a tight cluster on his chest, near his throat. Blood bubbled up out of the man’s mouth and he fell forwards to his knees on the tail of a wet, choking noise. The third guard stepped up to stand directly over the body of his fallen comrade, firing back at Stiles without any concern for the guard at his feet. Stiles took _that_ guard out with another cluster of bullets in the chest and then dropped to one knee to reload.  


The last guard immediately turned tail, sprinting back the way the guards had come from and shouting at the top of his lungs in French.  


Scott didn’t let himself think about it. He started to rise up to his feet again, using the weight of his momentum to fling his shield down the corridor. It threw sparks as it rebounded off of the wall at just the right angle to slam into the guard’s head, cutting him off in mid-bellow. It continued on at a new angle, bounced off of the opposite wall, and by the time Scott had fully straightened it was back in his hand.  


Silence enveloped the hallway as Stiles stood. Then, with a hushed, breathless reverence, Stiles’ voice cut through.  “...That. Was. _Incredible_. How did you-”  


Somewhere deeper in the stronghold, a distant siren started to wail.  


“No time.” Scott determined, lurching into a run. “We need to get into the holding cells before they lock them down.”  


Behind him, Stiles laughed, a strained edge to the sound that belied his concern. “Aren’t they already in lockdown? Isn’t that the point of holding cells? To lock people down? Or up, or--put people behind locks, at the _very least_?”  


Scott spared a few seconds to glance over his shoulder in order to give Stiles a chastising look. “Will you _stop talking_ and _help_?”  


“Probably not,” Stiles grinned back, utterly unrepentant. “But I’ll _keep talking_ and help. Let’s go.”  


Despite the sarcasm, the only comments that Stiles made as they jogged were the ones necessary to guide Scott along the path he’d memorized. Scott could hear him grow more and more breathless as they moved, a sharp contrast to how completely unflagged Scott’s own strength and stamina felt. By the time they finally made it to the cells, having fought their way through two more patrols, Stiles was completely winded and trying to pretend he wasn’t at all.  


The detention area of the fortress was cut off from approach by a heavy metal door, held in place with a thick iron bar driven into the door frame. They’d hoped to be able to infiltrate quietly enough that the door would still be open, but both Scott and Stiles had known there was a better than even chance that they’d be caught before they got this far. Luckily, even a door of that fortitude was no match for a _True Alpha’s_ strength. Scott lifted one leg and kicked, near the handle, with all of his formidable strength.  


The door tore around its latch and went flying several feet into the room.  


Several feet beyond _that_ was a line of Argent guards standing ready with their weapons drawn. The moment the door settled into the dust on the floor, they opened fire.  


A bullet slammed into Scott’s shoulder and another tore a line through his bicep before he got his shield back into place. None of that bothered Scott much, because they weren’t wolfsbane bullets, and he could feel his body start to push the slugs out again almost as soon as they’d entered. The pain didn’t much bother him, either.  


No, what bothered him was the sound of a bullet slamming into flesh that wasn’t his, and the sharp cry of pain that Stiles made in reaction.  


Scott saw red in that moment. Time in the room seemed to dilate and slow down. The men before him moved as if encased in molasses, the emotions blooming so, so _slowly_ on their stupid faces. He leapt at them, a roar building itself up out of his chest as he grasped the first guard by the throat and threw him bodily into the nearest cage. His body left a dent in the bars as it slumped to the ground.  


The next got a similar treatment to the first, the third his arm snapped near the shoulder as he tried to turn his gun on Scott. None of them were prepared for the strength, the speed or the resilience of an angry werewolf. In what seemed like it had simultaneously been seconds and _years_ , the Argent guards were in a disassembled pile on the floor and Scott was turning, vision clearing, to seek out Stiles.  


His partner had taken shelter in the corner of the room and done his best to field dress the wound on his leg. Stiles’ face was already soaked with sweat and had gone a little pale, but he grinned up at Scott, showing too many teeth. “‘S fine. Went right through. I’ll be...I’ll be fine. Just not running...anywhere…”  


Scott shook his head, trying not to sound as strained as he did when he helped Stiles back to his feet. “Get out of the way of the _bullets_ next time, dummy.”  


“Yeah, I’ll be sure to do that, _Cap_. C’mon, we’ve...still got an objective.” Stiles wheezed through the words, not exactly full of humor, and jerked his chin in the direction of the cells in the room.  


Inside were maybe a dozen men arrayed in prison attire, split between two cells that were little more than enormous cages. Some of them looked more haggard than others, but every soul in those cells was staring at Scott and Stiles as they hobbled closer. Their faces were detailed sketches in wariness and weariness, and Scott was certain that his little display just moments ago wasn’t helping their disposition towards him any. He tried to smile as he draped one of Stiles’ arms over his shoulders and dragged them both to the cells. “I’m Captain Scott McCall of the US Army. We’re here to get you boys out.”  


The padlocks on the cages were industrial, large and intimidating. They also snapped like dry kindling the moment Scott put his strength to them. The cell doors seemed to make an impossible amount of noise as they rolled open, to Scott’s ears, but he supposed it didn’t matter. By this point, their cover had been blown into pieces smaller than the grains of sand.  


The Howling Commandos didn’t need to be told to arm themselves as they came out of the cells, for which Scott was relieved. One of the men turned to him when they’d finished that task, expression grim and determined. “What’s the plan now, Captain? I think I speak for all of us when I say we’ve had enough of the Argents’ hospitality.”  


Scott glanced to Stiles, trying to gauge his readiness. He looked worn-out and in pain, but he nodded, reaching to silently offer to carry Scott’s shield for them while Scott tried to support himself and half of Stiles’ weight too. Scott let him.  


He nodded back, first at Stiles, and then to the Commando awaiting instructions. “Now we follow Sgt. Stilinski’s directions and get the hell out of here. There’s a few toys parked in the yard that we’re going to take with us when we go.”

  
They must have known exactly which toys Scott meant, because another Commando, with a thick Australian accent, gave a deep, heartfelt laugh. “Now _that’s_ my kind of rescue.”


	9. Chapter 9

The siren deep in the stronghold was still blaring, rattling urgency deep into Scott’s skull. It underpinned every motion, the way that the Commandos spilled out into the hallway in a protective fan, spread out to protect Scott and Stiles from most angles. Scott was tangibly, viscerally aware of how much they were going to slow the Commandos down, with Stiles unable to put any weight on his injured leg. He was tempted to send the Commandos ahead, but without Stiles’ knowledge of the Argent Fortress’ it was too likely that the Argents would recapture the POWs, or worse, simply kill them.  


Every moment he spent trying to solve the puzzle, with the weight of every other pair of eyes riveted on him, felt like a noose tightening around their necks.  


“Stiles.” Scott kept his voice low and intent, as if somehow he were worried that the Argents would hear him, after all of the sirens and the gunfire. “I need to carry you.”  


Despite how close Stiles’ face was to his own, Scott could make out every inch of his vaguely wounded pride. “What?”  


“I have to carry you. I’m strong enough that it won’t slow me down. We’ll move faster than we would with your hurt leg, and you can still give directions to the Commandos.”  


For a second, Stiles leaned back faintly, sweeping his attention across the battered, bedraggled men waiting to complete their escape. He frowned in a way that Scott had long learned meant that some atrophied part of his conscience was starting to scratch at the edges of his skull. “...How are you gonna fight the Nazis if you’re carrying me, Scott?”  


Scott was already shaking his head, shifting Stiles around so that he could pull his friend up onto his back, whether or not Stiles really went along with the idea. “You’re gonna fight the Nazis. Your arms are just fine. I’ll just carry you and be your legs, and you can be my arms. You keep the gun and the shield. C’mon.”  


It was almost pathetically easy to pick Stiles up, but Scott knew somehow that even if they’d found themselves in this situation when Scott was shorter, smaller, and more asthmatic, he’d have managed if it meant getting Stiles out safely. He ignored all of Stiles’ low, quiet grumbles about how completely undignified it was to get a piggyback ride out of a secret enemy base and instead slung Stiles against his back, gripping as gently as he could under Stiles’ legs given that one of them had a bullet in it.  


It was, without a doubt, one of the most awkward things Scott had ever done in his life. Although he has caught up quite a bit on the height differential between himself and Stiles, Stiles was still taller, with long gangly limbs that seemed to exist only to get in the way. Yet despite that, they managed, moving at the same urgent lope that the Howling Commandos used. There were very few words needed for them to work as a unit, which freed Stiles up to give directions at every junction, sliding words between gunfire and footsteps.  


Slowly, they clawed their way through the fortress, avoiding fights when they could. More often than not, they found packs of Argents entrenched in the hallways, fighting so intense that they'd had, more than once, to exchange empty weapons for ones looted off of the bodies of the enemy.  They made it down three floors of skirmishes and skulking before, somehow, all Hell managed to break loose in a place that Scott would have already called Hell.  


He felt it before he heard it, and Scott _felt_ it before anyone else was aware it was coming.  


The terrible rumble of a large machine, bearing down on their position from outside the walls. Scott had barely enough time to jump backwards, dragging Stiles along with him, as he screamed, “INCOMING!”  


The wall to their right just _exploded_.  


Sickly blue energy arced over their heads, laced with chunks of stone from what had been the fortress’ wall just moments ago. It rained down on them like an avalanche, all noise and fury and destruction, and it was everything Scott could do just to keep himself and Stiles from being buried underneath it all.  


The explosion left a massive hole in the wall leading into the courtyard, which was immediately dominated by the main gun barrel of one of the tanks. The Howling Commandos dove to one side almost as one man, highly trained and capable. Scott and Stiles dove to the other, infinitely less coordinated. Stiles cried out in brief pain as they rebounded off of the wall wounded leg first. Scott couldn’t let himself think about that.  


Much more urgently on his mind was the fact that he and Stiles had just been separated from the Howling Commandos unit, and despite his enhanced speed and strength, Scott was certain he wouldn’t be able to cut across the path of that tank. Panic speared deep in his chest and tried to make a home.  


“Captain!” The voice somehow cut through the chaos and the noise of the burgeoning battle, drawing Scott’s attention to the other side. He could just barely see the Australian Commando through the rubble and under the gun of the tank as it struggled to rotate towards the main group. “We’ll take care of this! You two go! Find another way out. We’ll hold their attention!”  


It was as good an offer as they were going to get, as good a chance as Scott was going to be handed to get Stiles out _alive_ , since he’d already missed his shot on _unharmed_. It still felt like abandoning the men they’d come to save.  


If he left, some of the Commandos might die. If he hesitated for long, they would _all_ die. He could feel his whole face stretch around his distress, but Scott found himself nodding anyway, shouting across the gunfire and hoping he was heard. “When you get out, head west. We’ll rendezvous with you in the woods.”  


Then they turned and fled back down the hallway that they’d come out of, Stiles still trying to split the difference between clinging to Scott’s body and guarding it with the shield.

Without the Commandos, they actually moved faster. It was easier to slip unnoticed around corners and through corridors, with the attention of the Argents focused squarely on the assault against the courtyard. Stiles continued to give them directions, although he seemed less confident about the path they were taking than he did before. Scott refused to let himself worry about that.  


Instead, he continued to carry his best friend behind enemy lines, also trying not to think about how much blood Stiles must be losing, how they could be found and overwhelmed at any moment, or how tired his arms especially felt, from holding Stiles’ weight up for so long. He refused to complain, because at least he didn’t still have a bullet in him, and beyond that, complaining felt like it would lead to nothing but defeat. Scott wasn’t about to let this defeat them. He was going to get Stiles out of here.  


They wound their way down and down, passing between the fortress proper and its worked stone to something more crude, tunnels hewn out of the living rock, and back again several times. The quality of the air changed, the more they moved and the further they got from the battle, becoming cooler and more damp. It might have even been pleasant, under different circumstances.  


And then it was all ruined again, when they turned the next corner to find themselves face to face with a man with insufferably hard eyes and a smug look on his face. He tipped his chin upwards even before Scott and Stiles had gotten fully around the corner, his voice raspy and heavy with its French accent. “Ah. So you must be the man the newsreels are calling _Captain America_ , no? And your little lapdog sergeant, too.”  


Scott couldn’t restrain himself. Something about this man immediately set him on edge, and he found himself responding with a low, threatening rumble deep in his chest. It seemed to shock all three of them to realize that he was legitimately growling.  


The Argent seemed to recover quickest. There was no kindness in the smile that spread across his face. “Oh, I’m sorry, perhaps I was wrong about which one of you is the lapdog. After all, you go wherever your master tells you to go, don’t you? Always following the leash, bite the good bite? Such an uncomplicated life. It must be so nice for you.”  


Stiles tensed, his breathing quickening. Before Scott could pull himself together enough to intervene, Stiles raised the sidearm he’d been defending them with and fired a round.  


It wasn’t that Stiles was a poor shot, because he _wasn’t_. He was at least as good as Scott, maybe better, and that was without all of the added help from supernaturally acute sight or hearing. He hit the man just fine, a wet spot of red flowering on the top left of the enemy’s chest.  


It was more that the man didn’t seem to _care_. The bullet slammed home with a wet sound, and then the Argent started to _laugh_.

The whole hallway filled with that ugly laughter, so sharp and immediate and terrible that it seemed to cover even the sound of the battle in the now-distant courtyard. It was completely incongruous for a few moments, until Scott could see that the bullet was being pushed back out of the man’s body, in exactly the same way that the bullets had been expelled from his own body earlier in the detention cells.  


Color drained from Scott’s face in a cold rush, and the man just kept _laughing_. “You’ve figured it out, haven’t you? You’re not nearly as unique as your Army would like you to believe. You thought you had kept that agent from returning with the formula, hadn’t you? The arrogance of youth. Where do you think your precious scientist came from to start with?”  


Scott growled again, suddenly overcome with a need to rip the superiority off of the man’s face with his claws. It was an unfamiliar rage, something that roared inside his ribcage. He could feel the fight burning along his limbs, and with his eyes fixed on the older man’s face, Scott started to put Stiles down and prop him against the wall.  


The Argent must have known the fight was coming, too, because he drew himself up by his spine, suddenly standing straighter. Something happened with his face, then, that turned Scott’s stomach even beneath all of the fury; it shifted, like Scott’s did, but unlike Scott, he went far beyond a little extra hair and some fangs. The very structure of his face seemed to flow and change, bones realigning, until his visage was less human and something out of a Lovecraftian story, misshapen and pulling out around his mouth like a proto-muzzle.  


He opened that almost-muzzle, probably to fill the stunned silence with a roar, but Stiles beat him to the punch by asking Scott in a tone so detached it was almost conversational, “...you don’t have one of those, do you?”  


Scott sure hoped he didn’t.  


What did have, were claws, slipping free of his fingertips as he took a step forward. His fangs dropped, too, filling his mouth with intent to injure. Scott took another step forward.  


To Scott’s utter confusion, the Argent took a step backwards.  


It didn’t make sense until he noticed the direction of the man’s glowing blue eyes. They were fixed on Stiles.  


His instincts wouldn’t let him turn his back on the enemy entirely, so Scott slid his back foot around, pivoting around the front one, until he had one side presented to the Argent and the other pointed towards Stiles. Only then did he risk looking back at his friend.  


He hadn’t actually looked at Stiles in too long, having been too focused on just carrying him out of the battle. Now, seeing what he’d been missing, Scott was filled with utter regret and dread. The leg of Stiles’ uniform seemed soaked with a disproportionate amount of blood, despite the efforts they’d made to tend to and tie off the wound. He was pale and sweaty, slumped against the wall and slowly losing altitude. He’d already lost his grip on the gun, but was obviously and valiantly trying to at least cover himself with the shield. Never before had Scott seen a man so utterly personify the concept of _fading_.  


“Oh, yes, now you understand.” Their enemy crooned, as if he was somehow delighted by their predicament. “You can only do one thing, Captain. Do you go after me, knowing that I am Gerard Argent and undoubtedly the root of all of this so-called _evil_ you’re trying to dig out, or do you save your friend? Do you save the hundreds of empty faces your Army believes mine will destroy, or do you save just one, right in front of you?”  


Scott flexed his claws helplessly looking between Stiles and this man-- _Gerard_ \--with his lips pulled back. Eliminating Gerard right now--if he even _could_ \--might put an end to this nightmarish version of Project Lycan before it even started. But a protracted chase and fight would mean abandoning Stiles when he was in no state to defend himself.  


It really shouldn’t have been any choice at all, but Scott still felt a splinter of guilt stab into his heart as he forced himself to put his claws away. He took a step backwards.  


“I see exactly where your priorities lie, _Captain America_.” Gerard laughed that hideous laugh again, turning on his heel to sprint away from them.  


Scott turned towards Stiles to find that Stiles had lifted his bleary eyes up in Scott’s direction, somewhat astonished. He made an indistinct gesture with his chin, indicating the way Gerard had left. “G’wan. Get him. Go!”  


Hands shaking, head shaking, heart and _body_ shaking, Scott reached down to pick Stiles up again, trying to hold enough of Stiles’ weight to just get him _out_ of the Argent Fortress. “No. Not without you.”

  
There was no more argument to be made on the matter. Scott had made up his mind, and now it was time to leave.


	10. Chapter 10

By the time they got out of the fortress and rendezvoused with the noisy convoy that the Howling Commandos had made out of the tanks, Stiles had lost consciousness. None of the tanks were large enough to put him inside of them, so instead they laid Stiles out on top of the chassis of one, crowded into place by the gun turret. There wasn't much room left _on_ the vehicle, either, but that didn't stop Scott. He clung to it anyway, claws dug into the grooves of the metal, and kept his body low, huddled over Stiles to protect him and keep him on the tank.  


Their tank stayed in the center of the formation, guarded by the rest of the squadron. They rolled cautiously through the French forest towards the airfield, moving far too slowly. The tanks weren't meant for this terrain and part of Scott understood that, but the rest of him wanted to scream. He wanted to claw through every tree between Stiles and relative safety, but instead he had to wait, shouting directions to the driver of the tank to be relayed to the head of the column. It felt like torture. He didn’t want to imagine what it must have felt like to Stiles, even unconscious, so of course that was all he _could_ imagine.  


Finally, after far too long, the convoy rolled into the clearing of the airfield, hatches thrown open to expose themselves as allies. Scott couldn't wait for the slow-moving tanks any longer. He scooped Stiles’ body up into his arms and leapt down off of the tank chassis. It seemed like the easiest thing in the world to outpace the tanks and the attempts to reassure allegiances, so that he could carry Stiles into the camp roaring their need for aid.  


He only stopped roaring when Talia Hale came sprinting out of the tent area, fast enough to blur around her edges. She reached up to touch Scott by his shoulders, trying to slow him down, and despite himself Scott showed his fangs. She ignored him, asking instead, “What happened?”  


“He was shot during the extraction.” Scott panted out the words, desperation on his face. He needed Talia to lead him to the tent where Stiles could get medical attention, but she was just _standing_ there, stupidly, staring at him. “I couldn’t protect him! He was _shot_! In the thigh. He’s bled...he’s bled _so much_.”  


Talia reached down, trying to take Stiles’ limp body from Scott, but he growled again. He couldn’t allow it. He _wouldn’t_ allow it. He could feel his eyes were burning crimson when Talia looked back up to meet them, but she didn’t push him. Instead, she nodded, turning to run back the way she’d come. Clutching Stiles to him, Scott followed.  


Time began to stretch out and distort, all out of proportion with itself, as they ran. They crashed in through the flap of the medical tent in what felt like slow motion, Talia moving ahead to clear of a surface to operate on. Scott laid Stiles out on it and then immediately flashed his claws into existence. He hooked them into the makeshift bandaging and the ruined fabric of Stiles’ pants leg and tore it all free.  


Given access to the wound, Talia moved quickly and efficiently. She guided the medical team through the act of cleaning the injury and extracting the bullet, stitching it all back together and rebandaging it. There would be an ugly scar there when Stiles healed, Scott imagined. He was more settled with that notion than he expected to be. A scar on a living Stiles was better than the other alternative.  


“He’s lost a lot of blood, Scott.” Talia’s voice shook him out of his consideration with more concern and gentleness in her town than Scott had heard before. It made his heart clench up tight at the bottom of his throat when he realized what she was saying. “We’ve done all we can for him regarding the wound. We don’t have any blood we can give him. Now all we can do is wait, and hope, but I’m just not sure--”  


If he’d ever heard words he wanted to hear less, in his entire life, Scott couldn’t think of them. He didn’t want to _hear_ that all of his efforts hadn’t been enough, and that despite everything that they’d endured and been through, he’d _failed_ Stiles. It had been _his_ responsibility to keep Stiles safe and he’d _failed_ , and the idea that he could _lose_ Stiles over his own failure was whistling down on him like incoming mortar fire. It made his whole body feel tight and hot, burning out from the inside. Scott could feel his claws slip free of his fingertips again and he curled them up until they cut deep into the flesh of his palms. The pain didn’t ground him. It didn’t make anything easier to bear. It just made his knuckles tickle with the sensation of blood rolling off of them.  


When the mortar shell finally landed, it was the solution and not the problem that it struck Scott with.  


His head snapped up, eyes still red and a little too wild as they fixed back onto Talia. “Use mine.”  


Confusion clouded Talia’s face, and Scott frustrated at the fact that she didn’t immediately follow what he was trying to communicate. “Use your _what_ , Captain McCall?”  


“My _blood_.” Scott insisted, lifting his hands to show his bleeding palms to Talia. With his claws pulled free of the wounds, the healing had already started, but his hands were still red-streaked. “He and I have the same blood type. You can take my blood and give it to him. I’ll be _fine_. I’ll heal a lot faster than he will.”  


Talia looked horrified, rocking back a step. “Scott, we can’t do that.”  


“Why _not_?” The growl worked its way up from Scott’s throat without being called for. His hands opened and closed again; he hadn’t quite managed to put his claws away yet, and he could see the slick blood reflecting off of them in his periphery. “He’s hurt! He needs blood, you just told me he needs it. He _needs_ this! I can’t just stand here and watch when I could be helping him!”  


“Scott, you’re a werewolf. We have no idea what putting werewolf blood into a human will do. It could contaminate him, it could make him into a werewolf too! Or, worse, something that isn’t’ quite werewolf _or_ human. It’s too much of a ri--”  


“ _ **I DON’T CARE!**_ ” Scott made a sound utterly unlike anything he’d ever let out of his chest before. It was a roar, like other roars, but there was something dualistic about it that he hadn’t managed before. He sounded as if he had a dozen different voices as he roared, feet planted and shoulders thrown back, and every instrument and artifact in the tent that wasn’t tied down rattled. Even in his unconscious half-sleep, Stiles groaned, face scrunching up with pain.  


It was only that expression of pain that allowed Scott to pull himself back to continue in a more reasonable tone of voice. “You’re not even sure he’s going to survive. If we do the transfusion and it doesn't work, we lost nothing. But I can't just stand here full of the blood he needs and let him die when it might save him. I don't care if it gives him werewolf abilities and I don't care about it compromising your program. I care about _him_.”  


Talia’s wince looked like it went down to her bones. “You can't ask me to-”  


“I’m not asking you. I’m _telling_ you. If this goes wrong, I’ll take full responsibility. Talia, _please_. Let me help my friend.”  


Her shoulders dropped, and Talia swept her gaze back over Stiles, pale and sweat-soaked on the gurney with the leg of his uniform still ripped open. She swallowed so heavily Scott could see her throat work from where he stood. Then she nodded, voice quiet. “Okay. We’ll do it.”  


To their credit, Talia and the medical team worked with the same tight-knit efficiency in doing a job they objected to as they had in trying to treat Stiles’ wound. Stiles’ gurney was moved around to the side of the tent and Scott instructed to lay on a second one, not very far from Stiles’ side at all. Talia produced a syringe of somewhat intimidating size, marked on the side of the glass with mililiter measurements. Connected to that syringe were a pair of rubber medical hosing, each tipped with its own needle point. It didn’t take long for Scott to figure the purpose of the thing.  


It also didn’t take Talia long to get it hooked up. Once the transfusion started, a strained, unhappy hush seemed to fall over the tent. The medical staff, Talia included, huddled in the opposite corner of the tent, murmuring to each other, but Scott’s sharp ears made it far too easy to hear how they spoke of the danger of the procedure, how sure they were that it _wouldn’t work_ , how certain they were that this was far too much of a risk to have taken. Scott ignored them and instead tried to focus on the sound of Stiles’ pulse and breathing beside him. As long as he still had those to listen to, everything else had been worth it.  


Exhaustion crept in from all sides. Scott dozed off in the silence between Stiles’ heartbeats.  


When he woke again, someone had removed the transfusion apparatus. There was no mark on his skin to indicate that the needle had ever been there, no drained sensation to indicate he’d lost any blood. For a few moments, Scott was struck with the panicked idea that maybe they’d stopped the procedure the moment he’d fallen asleep. He swallowed down a sound of fear and pushed himself up onto his elbows, blinking his vision clear enough to look around the inside of the tent.  


On the gurney beside him, Stiles was also sitting upright. Someone had gotten him a fresh change of clothes, or at least clothes that weren’t covered in blood and torn to shreds by an alpha’s claws. He was still pale, he still looked like he hadn’t slept in the past ten years, but Stiles was awake and moving. Scott had never been more grateful to see Stiles’ face of absolute disgust as he tried to work his way through a biscuit he’d gotten from a field ration kit.  


Relief flooded Scott’s limbs, such a powerful anesthetic that he thought for a second he would just fall back asleep. He managed to cling to consciousness, straightening further. “You’re all right.”  


“For a loose definition of all right.” Stiles agreed without looking up from his biscuit. He shuffled through the contents of his ration kit, where he’d spread them out over his blanketed legs, selecting a tin and offering it in Scott’s direction. “They gave me a C ration. You want something? I’ve got, uh. Meat and vegetable hash, fruit cake, uh. Peanut butter. And...coffee. Plus a thing of vanilla caramels Talia gave me, I’m not trading those.”  


“Stiles.” Scott breathed, unsure if he was scolding Stiles for moving right past the obvious topic, or just grateful that Stiles could hold enough of a conversation to do so. “I don’t need your ration. I just--how...how are you feeling?”  


Stiles’ face scrunched up on one side, lips pursed together in consideration. “Not great, I’ll tell you that much. But better than I was feeling. Leg looks good, or so they say. Talia says I’ve got you to thank for that.”  


“I’m surprised she told you that. She didn’t want to let me do it.”  


Dropping the first tin he’d picked up, Stiles chose a different one and held it out, waggling it in Scott’s direction until Scott deigned to take it. He let it tumble through his fingertips after he had, not bothering to look down at whatever he’d been handed. He was too distracted by the way Stiles looked up through his eyelashes at Scott, like he thought they were sharing secrets. “Well, I’m glad you out-stubborned her. I would have been pissed as hell if we got all this way and all it took was one little gunshot wound to take me out.”  


Scott puffed out a sound that he’d wanted to be a laugh. It wasn’t much of a laugh at all, but he’d tried. “ _Yeah_. Are they going to let you … I mean, are they going to send you home? You’ve been wounded and everything, they’re supposed to send you home now, right?”  


“Nah.” Stiles refused the idea casually, like setting aside Scott’s suggestion of where to go for dinner. “Talia says she’s optimistic that I’ll make a full recovery. She wouldn’t say how much of that was because of your magic life-saving super blood. Either way, doesn’t matter. I’ll heal up. It’ll give time for the Commandos to get back in fighting condition. We’re going to be assigned to their unit for the time being. I think they were impressed at how you got everybody out of that Argent facility.”  


There were a lot of things Scott wanted to say to that, mostly that it had been a team effort and it had been very little in terms of leadership from him that had gotten anyone back out of the fortress alive. He didn’t say those things, instead looking down at the tin in his hands. _Fruit cake_. Of course Stiles had given him the fruit cake.  


Of course Stiles was trying to lean across, patting at the first part of Scott’s body he could reach over the gap. It was probably meant to be reassuring, but it was mostly clumsy and covered in cracker crumbs. “Don’t worry, buddy. You’re stuck with me for a little while longer, at least.”

  
The smile Scott aimed downwards at his fruit cake as he pulled the ring tab on the tin felt like the first smile he’d given in a long time.


	11. Chapter 11

Stiles was given a full day of recovery in the medical clinic before the Howling Commandos were rotated off of the front lines and took Scott and Stiles with them.  


Capturing the small fleet of personal tanks and eliminating the Argent base in the process had dealt a serious blow to the Axis forces in the region, and thus earned the unit a small amount of grace from their superiors. Not much, because they were still At War and grace was in short supply, but enough that they had time to recuperate and heal. To the reasonably healthy members of the squad, eager to fight, it must have felt like an eternity.  


To Scott, it felt like it had lasted no more than a heartbeat.  


All too quickly, Stiles was back on his feet, insisting he was well enough to fight. All too quickly, the unit was running through basic drills, incorporating Scott as a front assault specialist, with his ability to take so much punishment without flinching, and Stiles as his overwatch, protecting his flank dutifully from the treeline with a sniper rifle.  


Even separated, they worked flawlessly as a single unit, as two men with a single mind and purpose. Folded into the ranks of the Howling Commandos, they seemed almost unbeatable.  


As the strength of Stiles and the men who had been tortured by the Argents improved, the unit moved back into active combat. The assignments they were given were never usual. There was always something strange about their missions, some item or person that needed retrieving which made it the kind of high-risk effort the Howling Commandos had become so good at. The rest of the war swirled around them, focused on the Fuhrer and his Nazis, but for Scott and the Commandos, the war was against the forces of Argent.  


Scott had lost track of how many artifacts they had liberated from the Argent clutches. At some point it had stopped mattering. It hadn’t taken long for them to realize that the Argents’ alliance with the Axis powers was one of convenience. They existed like a parasite attached to the underbelly of the Nazi war machine, draining resources and time and energy in order to feed itself and grow its own agenda. Scott knew in the heart of him that Gerard Argent held no love for the Fuhrer or his ideologies, knew in his core that the Argents had only signed on as a stepping stone towards their own goals, and as soon as they had taken everything they could, they would cut themselves loose and become a discrete, terrible entity.  


Just as Scott knew in the heart of him that the _enemy_ of his _enemy_ would never be his friend.  


They had struggled against the Argent tide at every turn, below the pained bellow of the rest of the war. At this point, Scott had done it for so long he was beginning to doubt that he remembered any other life. Those days in snowy Brooklyn when he’d been small enough to fit comfortably under Stiles’ chin seemed like wishful thinking, dreams from a fever he could no longer run.  


He didn't dream much any more, but when he did, he counted those fever-dreams as the best ones.  


They had liberated this small French town two days ago, and its people were grateful in a desperate, almost humiliating sort of way. They had done their best to build a tavern out of the tattered remains of their town, offering up get more than just the last of their alcohol to the forces that drove out the Nazis. Despite his best efforts, there were absolutely members of the Howling Commandos that took too much advantage of the townsfolk’s thankfulness. Scott had already discovered that was not something he could prevent. The best he could do was mind himself and try to make sure none of the men under his command truly crossed the line between accepting something freely given and taking something that was less so.  


It meant he spent a lot of time in the makeshift bar, trying to keep his two eyes on too many people at once.  


At least he could rely on Stiles being there with him, seated at just enough of an angle to maximize their view of the room, nudging him with a sharp elbow any time he caught something that Scott missed.  


This was the arrangement that their commanding officer found them in, with the early evening light poorly illuminating the room.  


“We just received the parameters of your next mission,” The Major started without any preamble, setting a stained, battered-looking folder of papers down on the paper between Scott and Stiles, “And it is of critical importance.”  


“Isn’t it _always_?” Stiles’ tone was dry like kindling, unamused and unengaged. He wasn’t even _looking_ at the Major, eyes half-hooded as he kept his attention on the room and the rest of the Howling Commandos as they interacted with the townspeople.  


The Major frowned, glancing towards Scott as if hoping to get support. Stiles and the Major had never gotten along very well--like most of the command structure, the Major seemed to believe Stiles was _insubordinate_ \--but he put up with Stiles because it was necessary to be able to work with Scott. Most of the time, Scott would save them from even the dullest edges of Stiles’ sharp tongue.  


Today, Scott was tired. Today, Scott just watched with a mild expression while the Major scowled.  


One grizzled hand came down on the file as the Major tried to push it closer to Scott’s area of attention. “I think if you would read the file, you would understand that no matter how important your previous missions were, this one is far more.”  


With a long, heavy sigh, Scott pulled the file closer and flipped it open, skimming the information on the first page. The more he read, the more his sleepy, disconnected feeling burned away into something more sharply electric. “This can't be right.”  


“All our best intelligence suggests that this is entirely legitimate.”  


Stiles’ attention was attracted not by the Major’s words but by Scott’s reaction. Frowning, he reached out to slip the folder out of Scott’s grip so that he could read it himself. He’d only skimmed a few lines before his voice dropped, kept close to the table to prevent the rest of the townsfolk and the squadron from hearing him. “This says that you believe we can assault a train carrying _Arnim Zola_ and _take him alive._ Arnim Zola. The evil genius behind all of Argent’s breakthroughs. His _connection_ to the Nazi war machine. _That_ Arnim Zola?”  


The Major glanced to Stiles as if confirming his questions was some kind of burden. “Yes. That Arnim Zola. This mission won’t be easy, but fortune favors us in the timing. His train, meant to take both him and his research further from the front lines, will pass not too far from here very soon. You and the rest of the Howling Commandos will assault the train from a nearby mountain rise. Capture is your first objective but if that is impossible you are not to allow either Zola or his research to escape intact.”  


Something caught up in Scott’s chest at those words. He frowned at the folder, although he wasn’t about to bother to try and reclaim it from Stiles’ grasp. He blinked slowly, lifting his eyes back to the Major. “If we do this, will this … will this eliminate _all_ of the enemy’s research on … people like me?”  


There was a wry, unamused sound that came up out of the Major, loud and judgemental enough to cause Stiles to look up from the file in a slow, dangerous sort of way. He didn’t act on it, if only because the Major moved on immediately, his head shaking. “We can’t afford to make that assumption. It sounds nice, but that’s kind of an ideology that just doesn’t survive in war. I’m sure they have copies of the notes somewhere. We won’t be eradicating them completely. But we _will_ be crippling their ability to make progress. That’s better than nothing, Captain McCall. This mission will be difficult enough without over-reaching.”  


For some reason, that was almost disappointing. Scott hadn’t had the time to really examine why the idea felt like a weight dragging his ribcage down, but part of him suspected it was due to the way so many people around him saw nothing _but_ _Captain America_ , none of the McCall and definitely none of the _Scott_. If the so-called _good guys_ were so bad at that, he couldn’t imagine how poorly people on the other side would be treated, just for having gone through the same program that had brought him here. It didn’t matter that they were on the wrong side; most of those men weren’t there because they wanted to be, and none of them deserved to be treated like nothing more than a weapon and a tool by their superior officers.  


Stiles leaned in a little and bumped his shoulder against Scott’s affectionately, sliding the folder over so that they could look through it together. “Come on, buddy. Look how fun this sounds. We rig up a zip line over the train tracks, here, and then just kind of throw ourselves at a speeding train and hope that we land on the roof instead of on the side or, I don’t know, in front of it. Don’t tell me that doesn’t sound like fun.”  


Somehow Stiles managed to make the word ‘fun’ sound more like ‘suicide’. There was something sharp in the way his eyes lifted to settle on the Major that implied he was aware of it.  


The Major was unrepentant. He didn’t even shrug. He met Stiles’ gaze without flinching. “I did say it was an extremely dangerous mission. This may be our only shot at Zola, and the Howling Commandos are absolutely the only unit that has a chance.”  


“I’m just saying,” Stiles said, the reasonable air to his words almost entirely put-on. “It would be a lot easier if you’d just let us set charges at this bridge a little later on, and blow the whole thing. Look at how far that drop is. The whole thing would just go right over the side, bam, no more Zola or his research. Easy. No circus acrobatics required.”  


“Your _primary objective_ is to bring Zola in _alive_. Elimination is a _far less desirable_ alternative.”  


Stiles bristled, the way he always did right before launching into something that would have earned him disciplinary action, if not a court-martial, in a different time and different circumstances. Scott sighed, lifting one hand to put it on Stiles’ forearm. He left it there until he felt Stiles start to relax.  


“We’ll do it,” Scott told the Major, expression serious, words grim, as if they had any actual say in their orders or whether to carry them out. It helped Stiles to maintain the illusion of control, even if Scott knew it to be a lie. “We’ll bring Zola back alive, if that will help end this God-forsaken war sooner.”

  
It couldn’t be said that the Major _smiled_ , but he came close enough, some of the tension easing out of the corners of his mouth. “That’s what we’re hoping, son. That’s what we’re all hoping.”


	12. Chapter 12

Within six hours, the Howling Commandos had reconvened and been briefed on the situation. Within twelve, they were already at the location, carefully setting up the equipment necessary to drop a few of their numbers on the roof of the Argent train. The wind had sharp, cold teeth as it whipped through the ravines. It swirled snow up off of the mountainsides, as if the stunt they were about to pull needed any more dramatics added to it. It made the zipline hard to see against the overcast white blur of the sky. Scott supposed that worked to their advantage. The last thing they wanted was the cable to be cut while they were in the middle of transit.

Scott could hear the train moving through the valley below at a brutal speed. Time was growing short. Soon they would have to fling themselves off of the side of the mountain and hope the cable held, hope they could hit the train as they expected to be able to. Scott wasn’t looking forward to the experience.

Stiles stood beside him with a pensive look on his face. He wasn’t leaning over the edge, exactly, but he was looking out over the valley, squinting through the snow. It could have looked peaceful, if it wasn’t for the rifle strapped against Stiles’ back, always reminding Scott that there was no such thing as peace. Stiles looked back up to Scott after a moment, his expression lopsided, like he was trying to smile and just couldn’t quite find it in him. “This would be a hell of a time to develop a fear of heights, huh?”

“You thinking you’re gonna chicken out on me, Stilinski?” Scott teased, trying to make his own expression more fond than terrified. He was feeling both, but it wouldn’t do to let any of the men behind him know how much of the second one he was  _ really _ feeling.

With an incredulous snort, Stiles reached out to clap Scott on the shoulder with one hand. “Never, buddy. Just checking in on you. Making sure  _ your  _ courage isn’t failing you.”

The train was streaking closer. This was no time for sentimentality, not with the mission in front of them and the Howling Commandos behind them. Still, Scott let himself look Stiles over and felt the fondness take over on its own, his answer too-honest. “With you here? It could never.”

“I hate to break up you guys’s little tete-a-tete,” A voice came from behind them, terse more than amused, “But you lovebirds are outta time. You’ve got a forty-five second window to get the whole strike team on that train, or you’re going to end up bugs on its windscreen.”

Scott snapped his attention back to the train. He hefted the trolley in his hand, and then snapped it onto the wire, giving it a brief tug to make sure that it was secure. There would be no time to detach a harness on a moving train, so it was all up to Scott’s conviction of mind and grip to get him there. He clenched his fingers down around the handlebars until he felt them start to creak under his strength, and waited. One heartbeat. Five. Ten.

Then the word  _ GO! _ seemed to shout in at him from every angle, and Scott jumped off of the cliff.

The world became wind and white noise. It no longer nipped at him, it slashed, it  _ bit _ , it blurred past his eyes until he could barely see what he was doing or where he was going. Scott choked back the urge to scream and tried to let his instincts lead him.

All too soon he hit the roof of the train boots-first, stumbling a step forward as he acclimated to the speed. Behind him, he could hear,  _ feel _ the impact of Stiles, Brown, and Vaughn as they made similar landings. Scott looked over his shoulder to confirm that none of them had fallen off of the train, only to be confronted with Stiles’ pale, grim expression and determined nod. Scott nodded back.

Then he turned forward, unstrapping his shield from his back in one smooth motion. He swung it down with the full weight of his torso behind him and all of his strength, driving the edge of it straight down into the train’s roof. It bit in like a can opener, allowing Scott to drag it in a shallow arc, slicing through with a tortured shriek of metal on metal. He pulled his arm back only to turn the angle of the shield, using its boss to punch a hole straight through the roof.

Brown and Vaughn descended down the back of the car, to secure the back of the train, but Scott dropped in through the hole he’d just made, Stiles close to his heels. He kept his body low to the floor, shield up, his sidearm in his right hand. Scott strained his senses, searching for the enemy, but the noise of the train and the heavy scents of oil and machinery blinded his advantage.

Instead, the train seemed desolate, unmanned but cluttered with cargo that Scott couldn’t identify at a glance. He glanced back at Stiles only to receive a shrug in response. They continued forward to the car junction in the same manner, both of them doing their best to shelter behind the shield. Scott struggled to keep his step light as he took the lead, moving from the car they’d infiltrated through to the next one ahead.

As soon as he was through the junction, the door slammed shut, separating him from Stiles.

He barely had any time to react, staring through the door’s window at Stiles’ horrified expression, before gunfire erupted in the car behind Stiles and he ducked down out of Scott’s field of vision. Scott started to lurch forward, maybe to just barrel his way right through the door, when the high-pitched whine of the specialized Argent weaponry alerted him to a problem in his own train car. He spun around only to just get his shield up in time to deflect the first volley of bullets that came from the overly large, armored man with the  _ mini-guns _ on the other end of the car. Scott wasn’t stopping to examine those bullets, but he had to assume they were laced with wolfsbane.

Scott rolled to the side, coming up behind a palette of metal boxes with his shield protecting his vulnerable side. The Argent soldier’s weaponry whined again, and this time what hurtled past him was not bullets but a huge ball of blue-white energy. It tore into the side of the train car, denting and shredding the metal.

He couldn’t afford take those shots head-on. Luckily, the weapon seemed to need time to warm up, which its wielder was filling with rounds from the mini-gun. Scott huddled behind the boxes and tried not to focus on the sounds of Stiles and another Argent soldier exchanging gunfire in the other car. He tried, desperately, to focus instead on his situation.

Attached to the ceiling of the train car was a crane system on a track, designed for loading and offloading cargo. The crane apparatus itself was on the end of the track near to Scott, but the track ended by his new friend with the big guns. He didn’t let himself hesitate. Scott lept from where he’d crouched and grabbed at the crane with his free hand. His momentum carried him down the track, legs tucked up to avoid crashing into the cargo. He could hear the energy weapon powering up again, but Scott was moving too fast for the soldier to compensate for. He slammed into the man with both legs, and then twisted his body, slamming his shield into the man’s face until it was clear he was unconscious.

Scott scrambled to the man’s side and hefted the energy gun, aiming it at the door between the train cars. It whined, and then kicked back hard enough that it almost knocked Scott onto his ass, but it also belched out a ball of blue light that knocked the door down. Scott leapt forward, dashing across the train car to where he could hear Stiles still firing. He had switched from his rifle to his sidearm, which was a bad sign.

As it turned out, Stiles was huddled in the corner of the train car, hiding behind another group of boxes. At the other end of  _ his _ car was a man with a machine gun. Scott was strangely grateful that he wasn’t carrying one of the Argent superweapons.

Putting his shoulders against the inside of the door, across from Stiles, Scott arrived just as he ran out of ammo in his sidearm. He caught Stiles’ eye as he moved into line of view, and mimed throwing the gun once before he actually did it. Stiles nodded, then looked back towards the soldier still firing at him.

Again, Scott took only a few seconds to analyse the situation. He came in through the door shield-first, all of his strength behind it. He slammed into the cargo in the center of the train car, shifting it in its bindings. It came crashing down on the other side, knocking the Argent soldier to the side. Stiles promptly shot him in the head.

Scott straightened, breathing heavily. He looked down the train car at the now-dead Argent soldier, and Stiles’ voice scoffed behind him. “I was letting him off easy, that’s all.”

What Scott wanted to do was snort and make a joke, or maybe to point out that in the middle of a spec ops mission in a  _ War _ wasn’t the time to let people off easy. He did neither of those things, because on the tail end of Stiles’ statement, Scott’s ears caught the whine of an Argent super-weapon powering up behind them.

The man with the mini-guns had woken back up.

Immediately, Scott inserted himself between the weapon and Stiles, shield in place. He tried to shout for Stiles to get down, but he couldn’t be sure that he’d done it, because at that moment the ball of energy slammed into Scott’s shield.

If he had missed his target on the zipline and slammed into the front of the speeding train, Scott imagined it would have felt something like this. He was thrown off of his feet, shield going one direction while Scott’s body went the other. He collided with the side of the train and rebounded onto his face, certain his shield arm had been broken. It had also already fixed itself, but Scott was dazed, struggling to stand.

Over the intercom, Scott could hear Zola’s voice instructing the soldier to fire again. The soldier took another step into the train car, clearly intent on doing just that. Scott fought with his own body, trying to push himself up, trying to get to his shield.

The weapon whined, and at the last possible second, Stiles appeared in front of Scott in a crouch, shield up, firing with Scott’s sidearm.

The shot from the Argent’s weapon hit the shield and ricocheted into the side of the train, ripping an enormous hole down its length. It tossed Stiles like a rag-doll, and Scott’s vision went red.

He lurched to his feet, snatching up his shield with one hand. His claws scraped along its metal as he spun to throw it like a discus at the enemy.  This time, it hit the man edge-first, cutting a brutal wound into his throat and torso and severing one of the tubes powering the super-weapon. Scott didn’t stop to watch the aftermath.

Instead, Scott scrambled to the side of the train. Through the ruined metal he could see the blur of the snowy mountains and the ravines rush by, fast enough to make his stomach churn. What was more stomach-churning than any of the heights in the world was the fact that Stiles was hanging out over the long drop, clinging desperately to the torn part of the train car.

Without a thought for his own safety, Scott began to climb out on the damaged wall, stretching his arm out towards Stiles. All he had to do was get a hold on him. All he had to do was  _ touch _ him, and he could pull Stiles back to safety. “Stiles! Come on, just grab my hand!”

The metal groaned and complained around them. Scott’s grip tightened and he tried to lean closer, bracing himself against the still-intact part of the train car. His claws sunk into the metal, but the hand stretched towards Stiles somehow remained without claws. Human. Desperate.

Stiles looked up to meet his eyes, and for maybe the first time in all of these missions they’d done, Scott saw real fear there. He saw when Stiles swallowed it down, nodding, and started to inch his way closer. He stretched his own arm out, trying to make it to Scott’s grip.

They were only inches from making contact when the scrap of metal that Stiles had been clinging to gave way. He fell, screaming, into the abyss.

The roar of fury and agony that tore itself out of Scott, like a living thing, chased him down, shaking the snow from the stones.


	13. Chapter 13

Scott couldn’t remember the rest of what happened on the train. Brown and Vaughn told him that he’d single-handedly torn through the remaining cars with his shield and his claws, and had to be reminded, loudly and repeatedly, that Zola was meant to be taken alive. He didn’t remember any of it, although he imagined it must be true, because somehow they’d all made it back to Allied territory with Zola still breathing.  


What he did remember, _all_ that he could remember, any time he closed his eyes, was the image of Stiles’ face as he fell, eyes wide with shock. All he could see was his closest friend falling to his death. Because _Scott_ had failed him.  


He replayed the fight in his mind a thousand times, searching for the place he could have done better, acted faster, or smarter. In the end, it didn’t matter how much he clawed through his memories looking for a different solution. None of it would fix what had been done.  


None of it would bring Stiles back.  


Nothing ever would, and that made everything seem utterly pointless.  


Scott withdrew from the rest of the Howling Commandos, unable to articulate his pain to them. It turned out he couldn’t run from it any more than he could fix it, so Scott fell back on his third option: trying to drown it.  


That was how Talia Hale found him, in the wrecked shell that was left of their habitual bar haunt, in the wake of a Nazi shelling. Scott had found a table and chair still intact and set them upright, lining the unbroken bottles he’d dug out of the wreckage on the top. He hadn’t been picky. Some of the bottles contained beer, others wine or whiskey. He was three bottles into the line, laying the empties down on their sides so he could stare down the necks of them, when Talia found a second chair and dragged it up to the table.  


They sat in silence while Scott worked his way halfway into the fourth bottle. Eventually, Talia made a quiet noise, rolling one of the bottles to the side with her fingertips. “How is this little project working out for you, Captain?”  


Scott frowned, first at the bottle and then up at Talia’s face. There was an urge bubbling up in his chest, that tasted too much of iron, to lash out at her. It wouldn’t achieve anything, so instead Scott managed to choke it back and instead transmute what would have otherwise been an attack to something more weary. “I think you already know how this is going.”  


Another quiet noise, one more of assent, and Talia tipped the bottle she was rolling back upright. “Your body processes toxins at an incredibly accelerated rate, now. Your metabolism is far more efficient, and your healing factor exacerbates it. You heal from wounds at an incredible rate, but you’re also virtually immune to poisons. Which includes alcohol.”  


“Which means I can’t get drunk.” Scott sighed, reaching out to put his current bottle back on the table. “So I guess I’m really just punishing myself with the taste.”  


“I know a few people who would disagree with your assessment of the flavor of these things. This bottle down here, especially. Even outside of wartime, this would have fetched a pretty penny.” Talia tapped the side of one of the empty bottles. Scott honestly couldn’t have said what was even in it. All he had tasted was the burn of alcohol and desperation.  


“Well, _they aren’t here_ , so what does it matter?” Scott knew he wasn’t really talking about the potential connoisseurs of whatever drink he’d so callously guzzled down. He knew that Talia knew it, too.  


Talia sighed, straightening so that she could lean back against her chair. She watched Scott for long enough to start to make him uncomfortable, scrutinizing the features of his face. “Tell me, Captain McCall, what would you have done, had your roles been reversed?”  


Scott paused, a frown tugging down at the edges of his mouth. He aimed it at the table before he found enough strength to turn it up in Talia’s direction. “I don’t know what you mean.”  


“If it had been Sergeant Stilinski who’d received the serum, what would you have done?” Talia clarified, her tone indulgent in a way that made it clear she was trying to lead Scott by his nose to a place Scott wasn’t sure he wanted to be. “Would you have enlisted with him? Insisted to be his handler with the same fervor that he showed? Walked into hell at his side?”  


The insult rose up inside of his head, begging Scott to roar his indignation. He could feel his eyes flash, spine straightening like he thought he was going to have to fight Talia over the topic. Maybe he _would_. There was something clawing at the inside of him, spoiling for that fight. “Of course I would! He was my best friend! I would have followed him anywhere!”  


The nod that Talia gave almost looked maternal, which only served to bother Scott more. “I see. So, then, is it that you didn’t respect your friend?”  


“Mrs. Hale,” Scott growled out the words, with a dangerous reverb laid underneath them. “I consider myself a gentleman and a friend, but you are really pushing my boundaries right now. That is not the kind of language I’m about to tolerate.”  


Talia did not seem concerned, despite Scott’s obvious anger. She shrugged, still meeting his eyes with calm determination. “It’s just that you seem to think all of this is your fault, when it isn’t. Stiles was a grown man too, Scott. He made his own decisions. Those decisions led him to stay at your side when you went into danger, yes, but they were still his decisions. You did not force him and you did not deceive him. The least you could do for his memory is to honor that, and to carry on the cause that meant so much to him.”  


Scott’s anger didn’t defuse, exactly, but it was as if Talia had tied an extra length to it. It was still burning somewhere deep in his chest, rage and grief and white-hot fire, but he was further from it somehow. She was right. Stiles wasn’t the only person that this war had killed, and sitting around in a bombed-out bar trying fruitlessly to get drunk wasn’t going to help the people the war was still hurting.  


He couldn’t save Stiles, but maybe he could make up for it by saving everyone else.  


Silence reigned. Talia dug a cigarette out of her pocket and lit it up, although Scott imagined that the nicotine was as useless to her as the alcohol was to him, so he didn’t really know why. She took her time with it, making it halfway through before she offered, quietly, “Zola gave up just about everything to the Major. I think he knows, now, that the Argents will kill him if they can. We’re the best hope he has to survive.”  


Bile roiled in Scott’s throat, and for a moment he felt like he had almost stepped outside of his body, imagining himself with his claws three inches into Zola’s soft, tender throat. He scrunched his eyes closed and shook his head, trying to clear it. “Yeah? Did that actually get us anywhere?”  


“Actually,” Talia’s tone implied she was _surprised_ about this, “yes. It did. We know where the Argents’ main base is. Where Gerard Argent is most likely holding out for a final confrontation.”  


Scott rolled his eyes open to fix their burning red light on Talia’s face.  


She tipped her head faintly in Scott’s direction, gesturing with her lit cigarette. “Do you think you’d be up for putting aside your little one-man wake, here, and avenging Sergeant Stilinski instead?”

  
Scott could feel his fangs drop out of his gums, pricking at his lips when he curled them into a smile that was equal parts snarl. “When do we leave?”


	14. Chapter 14

Despite his conviction that he could leave immediately for the Argent stronghold, Scott was forced to endure an actual strategy meeting. It felt like it had gone in slow motion, a bunch of tedious old men arguing over the safest way to do something that was as far from safe as it was possible to get. They had spent so long trying to determine angle of attack and armament that Scott’s exasperation had finally caught up with him and he had suggested, in all seriousness, that he just walk right up to the front door and _knock_.  


After a stunned silence swept over the room and every face had turned towards him, they had decided that Scott could do _just that_.  


That was how Scott found himself here, astride a loud, grumbling motorcycle and hurtling towards the entrance to the last great stronghold of the Argent menace.  


He was not the knife in the dark. He was the fist slammed against the door. Scott had no intention to be stealthy or subtle. There was a cold fire in his heart, one that had been searing him with its frozen rage since the moment Stiles had fallen from the train. It numbed his fingers, his feelings, and it wasn’t going to let him just sneak around inside this fortress like he had any intention of exfiltrating. The Army was going to let him batter himself against the gates like a sacrificial ram and Scott was happy to oblige.  


In the distance, a high-caliber rifle fired, and then its bullet zipped past Scott’s ear, close enough to raise the tiny hairs along his cheek and neck. He leaned to the side abruptly, veering out of the sniper’s immediate sight, and began to use a slightly more serpentine approach to his destination. He wasn’t going to prevent them from knowing he was coming, but he might manage to prevent a wolfsbane bullet in his skull before he got there.  


He roared straight up to the barricade at the front of the fortress, putting the bike into a slide at the last moment. Scott’s reflexes made the task of climbing onto the side of the skidding vehicle almost laughably easy. With his shield held in front of him and his claws out on the hand holding his gun, Scott leapt over the gates of the stronghold through a hail of bullets.  


Scott landed like a meteor. His vision was covered with a haze of red, the Argent soldiers around him cloaked in crimson and moving like they’d been caught up in webbing, slow to the point it was almost comical. He tore through them gun-first, and when that ran out of ammunition, he threw it aside and used his claws instead.  


Time quickly faded into a place where it had no meaning. Scott surrendered to his instincts and his reflexes. Those took him deeper into the Argent fortress than he’d thought they would, but eventually even an Alpha werewolf was slowed by sheer numbers, too many bullets in his body and too many men surrounding him willing to unload more. They took his shield from him, took him into custody, and Scott allowed them to do it. He had no delusions about the tenderness of the treatment he was about to receive.  


The soldiers dragged him through the base ungently, at a speed that barely allowed Scott to get his feet under him. His shield was slung haphazardly over the back of one of his escorts, the paint scarred with the passage of bullets. Scott himself had been protected in many places by the suit, but in many others it hadn’t seemed to so much at all. He left a plinking trail of used-up ammunition behind him as his body pushed the bullets back out.  


Eventually the soldiers brought him into what seemed to be the heart of the fortress. The room was spartan, cast in cold blue tones by the window on the other side that faced the sheer cliffs of the surrounding mountains. Standing facing those windows, his hands clasped behind his back, was Gerard Argent.  


Many of the Argent soldiers who had escorted him here departed at a single raise of Gerard’s hand. Only two stayed, gripping at Scott’s shoulders and trying to force him down to his knees. He let them without offering up a struggle, but he kept his chin down, looking up through his lashes and furrowed eyebrows.  


“Captain McCall.” Gerard intoned from his place near the window. There wasn’t another word for it, something dramatic to the point of theatrical in the way he spoke. “You seemed like such a practical man the last time we met. You’ve certainly been clever enough in the past to be a real thorn in my side. So tell me, what did you hope to gain here today?”  


“I came to stop you and your mad vision.” Scott spat out the words, curling his fingers against his palms and then releasing them again. He kept his eyes on Gerard, all but ignoring the men holding him down at the shoulders. “I came to put an end to this.”  


Red flashed through his gaze when Gerard turned, neatly on his heel. He paced closer, something peculiar in his gait. It was like he didn’t quite fit into his body right any more, too much of him stuffed into the guise of an old man with the hard eyes of a monster. He stopped a few steps in front of Scott and frowned, tipping his head to the side like he was trying to hear something faint. “That doesn’t seem to have worked out too well for you. Here you are, captured, in the heart of my power, and here I am, free and not at all _stopped_.”  


“I’ve been going easy on you.”  


The laughter that came from Gerard, then, had no humor in it. His face started to distort, an ugly visage sliding into place, and he crooked one hand so that his claws sprang free of his fingertips. In a motion too quick for the eye to quite follow, he’d lunged forward and slashed those claws straight across Scott’s face. “I know that the wounds an Alpha’s claws leave take longer to heal on a Beta. I’m interested to see if that’s true of another Alpha. How many times, do you think, will it take before your body gives up?”  


He slashed at Scott again, and again, more viciousness in every strike. Gerard didn’t seem to care if he struck the arms of his men, and his men didn’t seem inspired enough by the pain to move. They just stood there, putting pressure on Scott’s collarbones, and let Gerard tear at Scott’s face and chest. Each blow drew a hot line of pain and sticky blood, and despite the fact that Scott could tell he was still healing, he wasn’t healing nearly fast enough.  


Scott felt like he’d been put through a meat grinder by the time Gerard gave even the slightest pause. The old Argent crouched in front of Scott, his face still overtaken by that awful, exaggerated shift. It made his smile look so macabre it would have chilled Scott’s bones, had the numbness not overtaken them days and days ago. He reached out with one claw to tip Scott’s chin up, trying to force eye contact. “Poor, idealistic Captain Scott McCall. Joined the war to save lives and only managed to lose the ones closest to him. Such a pity. You could have had such power, being what you are. That is where you and I differ, you see. Soon, the whole _world_ will be my betas. Oh yes. Everyone who survives, at least. Obviously there will be some who cannot endure the process.”  


The ugly smile only grew uglier as Scott lifted a lip to show his fangs. “I admire your spirit, but it isn’t going to get you anywhere. I’m going to _take_ that spirit. Didn’t Fenris tell you anything? Or your _precious_ Talia Hale. A lone wolf isn’t worth _anything_.”  


Scott snapped his fangs together, satisfied when Gerard retracted his hand. “Who said I was _alone_?”  


That was about the time that the rest of the Howling Commandos ran down their ziplines and came crashing, boots first, through the windows at the end of the room.  


The men holding Scott’s shoulders down immediately let go of him to grab for their weapons. Scott rolled to the side, trying to ignore all of his injuries, and came out of the roll onto his feet. He used his momentum and the weight of his body, propelled by his legs, to uppercut the man holding his shield so hard he could hear teeth crack. The man crumpled, and Scott had to follow him back down again just to get his shield free.  


The room erupted into gunfire. The acrid scent of the gunpowder stung at his nose, the hairs on the back of his neck and his shoulders rose any time a round came too close to hitting him. Scott was well aware that Gerard’s senses and instincts would tell him what Scott’s own were reporting: they were wolfsbane rounds.  


Although he didn’t really have the time to take, Scott scuttled back a few steps to shelter in a corner once he had his shield free. He was breathing heavily and sticky with his own blood, trying desperately to both keep track of the firefight and also _heal_ enough to be worth something again. Across the room and through a cloud of gunsmoke, he could _just_ make out Gerard’s now-hulking form run off.  


His lungs burned as he breathed in, trying to sort through the sounds of the battle without making his ears ring. Much to his surprise, Scott wasn’t there, struggling, for long before Talia Hale appeared at his side. She placed one hand on the nearest part of Scott’s bare skin and the pain just started to spiral right out of him, as surely as she’d unstopped the tub of it inside him. Her eyes flared, and Scott could see her veins run black as she took his pain for her own.  


“You have to chase him, Scott,” Talia insisted, her voice strained, “You have to stop him. He’s modified the virus. Turned it into a gas, loaded it onto his plane. If he drops that bomb on...on a major city--they’re all either going to die, or they’ll turn into his mindless puppets. You have to--”  


Scott didn’t need any more explanation. He gave Talia one grim understanding nod.  


Then he swung his shield back into its harness on his back and began to _run_ , as fast as his body could go, on all four limbs like a wolf.

  
  



	15. Chapter 15

In a way, it was almost like being back in Brooklyn the day that he’d been given the serum. Scott ran with the full power of his body, stretching every limb out to its furthest reach and using the most of his strength to power him through the halls of the Argent stronghold. He was _fast_ , that way, faster than he’d even been on two feet, fast enough that it was almost difficult for him to keep the scent of Gerard in the front of his nose to follow his path.  


Almost. Gerard’s scent was powerful, acrid and sickly, and Scott was sure he could follow it even into the stinking pits of Hell, if that’s what it took to keep Gerard’s plan from coming to fruition.  


He traveled deep into the stronghold, speeding past soldiers running to the point of engagement, ones who were never aware of him as anything more than a blur and a breeze. He hunted through the twisted bowels of the place, single-mindedly focused on the scent of Gerard leading him onward, until Scott burst out of the main building entirely and into an airplane hangar that had been carved into the living rock.  


On the opposite side of the hanger were a pair of open doors and a massive aircraft trundling its way onto a runway beyond.  


He didn’t need to check in with the ambient scents to know that Gerard was on that plane, and with it the means to infect an entire city with his terrible, modified version of lycanthropy.  


Scott didn’t stop to even breathe. He just bolted straight through the hangar and began to chase the plane down the runway. He had no idea how Gerard had moved so much faster than he had, how he’d had enough time to reach the plane and prep it to take off, much less get it moving, but Scott was determined to catch up somehow. He was determined not to let this happen, not to let a man like Gerard Argent to recruit himself a host of unwilling, mindless drones, or to kill masses in the effort.  


The only problem was that even with his additional alpha speed, the fact was that Gerard was still in an _airplane_ , and catching up seemed an impossible task.  


Part of him suggested that was okay. That he’d given enough already, _sacrificed_ enough already, that Scott had pushed and bled and fought and he didn’t need to do any more of any of it. That it wasn’t his responsibility to stop this evil, that it was _bigger than him_ , and he’d given enough. Part of him suggested it would be best if he just gave in, saved himself the burning of his lungs and his legs and tell his superior officers that there was nothing he could do to stop this man.  


This man whom no one else even had the _chance_ to stop. This man who meant to take over the whole world and bend it to his twisted will.  


A voice bubbled up from the back of his mind, like a ghost whispering in his ear. It jolted along his limbs, a reminder of the purpose he’d had when he’d _joined_ this program. The whole point of this. It said, rasping and familiar, _Go get ‘im, Scotty_.  


Power surged through his body and somehow, impossibly, Scott put on an extra burst of speed that caught him up with the plane. He jumped, body screaming with the effort, and managed to grab on to the landing gear of the plane, just above the tire. He clung to it, hands aching, as the plane picked up speed and the wind whipped past his ears. It occurred to Scott almost too-late that he probably didn’t want to be wrapped around these mechanical parts when they retracted into the plane, so with his claws digging into crevices of it, he pulled himself up the landing gear and into the plane itself.  


The inside of the plane was strangely peaceful, once Scott got himself out of the place where the plane’s tires would tuck up. It ran far more quietly than any plane he’d ever been on, the propellers’ hum so seemingly distant that Scott thought maybe he wouldn’t have heard them at all if he hadn’t had preternaturally acute ears. All the decor--it was a plane large enough to _have_ decor--had been done in cool metallic colors, carefully shaped steel in an art deco style.  


Strangely, Scott found himself _angry_ at the idea of Gerard having a decent sense of aesthetic.  


He made his way forward from the place where the landing gear had been, trying to keep his footfalls as quiet as possible. A narrow hallway lead forward and then opened up into cockpit with a glass windscreen reinforced with steel beams. It was big enough to hold maybe half a dozen people comfortably, perhaps more. There was no sign of Gerard, but his scent was everywhere, so thick in the plane that Scott couldn’t get a direction on it.  


Slowly, Scott creeped up towards the controls of the plane, skimming his eyes over them like he could figure them out from afar, figure out how to turn the plane around and put it back on the ground at the Argent base.  


He had just about made it to the pilot’s chair when a flash of blue light stretched up from the ground and flung Scott backwards across the cockpit.  


“They really didn’t tell you anything, did they?” Gerard’s voice crawled out of the darkness behind him as Scott tried to shake the dazzle out of his eyes and get back onto his feet. “Such a pity. That’s mountain ash, there. Otherwise known as the rowan tree. A powerful tree, in mythology. Extremely magical. And, importantly, an impenetrable barrier to any supernatural creature. That includes you, now, Captain McCall.”  


Argent appeared out of the shadows chuckling, patting at a tank nestled into the back of the cockpit with one hand. It had some kind of nozzle extending out of it, and it didn’t take much time for Scott to realize that must be how Gerard laid down lines of the rowan ash, without being able to move it with his own bare hands. “But, I’m afraid, it doesn’t include you for long. You are still, frustratingly, in my way, and I’m simply going to have to remove you. I would say it’s nothing personal, but frankly, at this point it kind of _is_.”  


Scott had learned Gerard’s dramatic timing well enough, at this point, to get his shield up and in place as Gerard lunged for him. Claws rebounded off of the vibranium, and Scott snarled on his own, lashing out with his free hand to slash at Gerard’s knee. He mostly caught cloth, but snagged just enough skin and bone with the edges of his claws to draw out a roar of pain.  


The fight that ensued was more between desperate animals than men.  


They exchanged blows fast enough that hands and feet blurred. Scott caught Gerard under the ribs with his claws only to get cuts scored across his face in response. Spitting blood out of his mouth, Scott shouldered Gerard back, confident he felt something crack with the blow. Gerard slide to the side and came back around with a vicious strike at Scott’s kidneys, ripping through his uniform before Scott could bludgeon the joint of Gerard’s elbow hard enough to get him to draw back.  


They fought their way from one side of the cockpit to the other and back again, caged in by the walls of the airplane and the line of ash by the pilot’s chair. There wasn’t enough room for Gerard to take on his enormous, monstrous form, but that didn’t slow him down. Instead, it made it seem to Scott as if Gerard was _everywhere_ at _once,_ always on the attack, never letting up.  


Scott slammed his shield into Gerard’s nose and Gerard retaliated by grabbing at the edge of his shield and _flinging_ Scott with all of his deceptive might. Scott hit the ash barrier and bounced back again, skidding across the floor of the plane on his face.  


He flopped awkwardly into a crouch and put his shield up just in time to see Gerard begin a sprint from the other side of the cockpit, fangs bared and claws out. Scott braced himself, eyes hard and shining red over the level of his shield.  


Then, at the absolute last second, he threw himself out of the way of Gerard’s charging body entirely.  


The furious Argent impaled himself on the extended nozzle of the ash tank seconds later.  


The weight of his body and the rest of his momentum drove him down against the trigger. A wet, thick sound bubbled up out of Gerard’s mouth as he struggled, trying to pull himself free. The more he struggled, the more his limbs seemed to gain weight. His veins began to run black, like tar beneath his skin, and gradually the same thick sludge began to ooze out of the corners of his eyes, to drip from his ears. There was utter, confused shock on his face as he turned it to stare at Scott, wheezing through lungs that suddenly sounded like drowning, “...mountain... _ash_.”  


Then Gerard Argent went limp and still.  


Scott took just long enough to catch his breath, leaning against his shield. The plane wasn’t going to stop with him sitting on his ass, however, so as soon as he felt he could breathe again, Scott pushed himself back onto his feet. Every step was more steady as he made his way back to the line of ash blocking the way to the pilot’s chair.  


He raised one hand, trying to pass it through the air above the line. Like before, there was a flare of blue light and a resistance of pressure from every place where his palm contacted the invisible wall blocking his way. The harder Scott pushed, the harder the mysterious force pushed back, reminding him of something that had been taught in school about _equal and opposite_ reactions. He had a lot of respect for Newtonian physics, but Scott also didn’t have a lot of _time_ for them. Not while this plane was still hurtling towards civilization with a payload of unspeakable horror in its belly.  


So Scott raised his shield, put his shoulder behind it, and started to _push_.  


He thought of all the people ahead of him whose lives would destroyed, if he didn’t stop this plane. He thought of all the people below him, whose lives had already _been_ destroyed and yet who were struggling to continue on. He thought of all of the people behind him who had even had the chance to continue on taken from them. He thought of everyone he’d lost, all the great, deep wounds in his heart that would never heal. He thought of it all and he _pushed_.  


The blue light blazed, hotter and brighter, cloaking his body. It pushed _back_ , it burned at his body, it _hurt_ , and yet--  


\--with a sudden, anticlimactic _sigh_ , the ash barrier suddenly gave way, and Scott stumbled past to the controls of the plane.  


Settling into the seat, it became clear to Scott very quickly that there would be no turning this plane around. It was moving too fast, and his mastery of flying machines was dubious at best. There was only one real solution. The understanding of that reality closed around his battered heart like a fist, and Scott turned his attention from trying to guide the plane to finding the radio. He tuned in a guess at the frequency and then transmit, uncertain it would even work, “This is Captain Scott McCall of the U.S. Army making an emergency broadcast.”  


To his shock, moments later a familiar voice crackled to life over the radio. Talia Hale. “Scott? What’s your status? What’s your position?”  


“Gerard Argent is dead.” Time was pressing on the back of Scott’s head and he couldn’t spend the effort on radio procedure. “I’m flying his plane. It has a payload of weaponized werewolf virus. I don’t think I can land it.”  


“Turn it around,” Talia sounded like she was straddling the line between annoyed and desperate. “Come back. We’ve retaken the base, we can figure something out.”  


“There’s no time, Talia. I can’t turn it around, but I think I can force it down.”  


She actually took the time to transmit her scoff. “Are you kidding, just turn it around!”  


Scott let his voice take on a sharp edge. “I’m in the middle of nowhere right now! Talia, if I keep going a lot of people are going to die. This way--well. This way they get to keep on living and nobody has to be turned into a Beta against their will. This is better. This is the way it’s supposed to be.”  


He twisted the controls of the airplane, listening to its engines whine as it started its steep drive. Beneath the cockpit he could see the ice of the Arctic Sea stretched out, shimmering blue-white. It was beautiful, in its way, with the sun glinting off of it.  


The radio crackled again, Talia’s voice subdued. “...This is damn heroic, Scott. I’ll make sure they know that. I’ll make sure everyone knows what you did.”  


That wasn’t necessary, but Scott didn’t tell Talia that. If it brought her comfort, there wasn’t any reason for him to take that from her. Instead, he leaned over and murmured a rough, “Thanks. For everything.”  


Then he thumbed the radio off.  


He surrendered himself to the moment, secure in the idea that he was doing the right thing. This would save lives. This would solve so many problems. This would be his reward.  


He listened to the strain of the engines as the plane dropped out of the sky, felt the pull of gravity as the planet tried to hold him back. It couldn’t. There was no holding back this moment. The bright glare of the water broadened and sharpened until it was the only thing that could be seen through the windscreen. Impact was imminent.

  
Captain Scott McCall closed his eyes and thought of Stiles’ smiling face as the cold shroud of oblivion wrapped around him and pulled him under.


	16. Chapter 16

Scott McCall had never expected to wake up.   
  


It was a morbid thought to be having, especially for the first thought he was having in Scott didn’t even know how long, but there it was. He’d never expected to wake up. He didn’t even know how he was  _ alive _ .   
  


He could remember the force of striking the ice-bound water with the Argents’ plane. He could remember the bite of the cold as it overwhelmed him, the blackness closing around him. Scott could remember it being  _ so welcome _ , such a  _ relief _ .   
  


And yet, now, the blackness was nothing deeper than the insides of his own eyelids.   
  


Scott left his eyes closed and tried to take stock of the world around him, resigned to the fact that he was once more required to be part of it.   
  


He was laying on his back on a bed. The sheets were pulled up to his chest, and someone had folded his hands neatly over them. He was pretty sure that he was not in his uniform; certainly, at least, if he was, he was missing some essentials like boots, his belt, the harness for his shield. As his senses adjusted and regained their strength, scents and sounds began to filter in. Clean linen, soap, medical supplies and rubber tubing all crowded his nose, making it difficult to smell anything past it. Near to his bed, a radio was broadcasting a Brooklyn Dodgers game on a low volume. Everything else was the faint buzz of electricity and too muffled to hear, if Scott discounted the click of heeled shoes approaching.   
  


Scott opened his eyes.   
  


The hospital room was painted in soft creams and greens, meant to emphasize the warmth of the sunlight still spilling in through the window, but it was still a hospital room even under its comforting trappings. Everything in it was just a little too generic, a little too sterile, nothing personal or personalized about it. The effect was just a little disconcerting, like the entire thing was fake and constructed for his own benefit.   
  


Actually, the more he thought about that, the more he felt like he’d accidentally hit on something. Frowning, Scott slowly pushed himself up to sit on the bed, legs slung over the side and feet on the floor. He listened to the radio broadcast and only frowned more sharply.   
  


The only warning that the door was about to open were those heeled shoes, forever clicking closer. A young woman that Scott did not recognize stepped in behind the swing of the door, her face already poised in a carefully sculpted expression of surprise and concern. “Captain McCall. How are you feeling?”   
  


Scott suspected that  _ cagey _ wasn’t a great answer, even if it was the most immediate one that came to mind. Or maybe it was  _ caged _ , this growing, restless feeling that all was not right, that someone, somewhere was hiding something from him.  _ Lying _ to him. He knew it probably wasn’t the doing of the woman in front of him, directly, but she was the only other human being available to talk to. She got his focus, as uncomfortable as it might have made her. “Where am I?”   
  


“You’re in a recovery ward in New York City.” The woman’s voice sounded like she had trained for years to make it as inoffensive and soothing as possible. It raised the hair on the back of Scott’s neck.   
  


He took a long time to blink, trying to settle his nerves. They refused to be settled. Scott lifted his chin, determined to meet the nurse’s eyes. He wasn’t going to flinch. “Okay. But really, where am I?”   
  


Even the confused pout she offered in response seemed utterly and carefully constructed. “I’m afraid I don’t know what you’re talking about?”   
  


“The baseball game. It can’t be playing on the radio right now. I know, because I was at the game.”  _ With Stiles _ , Scott’s mind provided, but he choked it back. That wasn’t relevant right now. He wasn’t sure he was ever going to be relevant again. “So I don’t know if you’re trying to brainwash me or you just want me to be complacent, but I’m going to ask once more. Where am I?”   
  


The woman just stared, blankly, like she’d never considered the idea that Scott might not simply swallow the illusion.   
  


Something about it made Scott’s blood boil.   
  


His whole body tensed, the power itching under his skin. In one sudden moment of clarity, he realized that he could hear people beyond the room he was supposedly in, intercom muttering and chatter that had no place in a recovery ward of any type. He understood in totality that the room he was in was  _ literally _ a farce. With a wordless cry that was too many inches close to a growl, Scott launched himself off of the bed, past the nurse, and  _ through _ the nearest wall.   
  


It crumpled around him, not so much  _ like _ paper mache as much as it was actually paper mache. Scott exploded through into a hallway on the other side that way as stark a difference from the comforting, warm-earth-tones of the recovery room than ever a hallway could be.   
  


Everything was wrong. The colors were sudden blues and greys, the gently curving hallway constructed primarily out of steel and glass. A collection of confused, stunned people stood staring at Scott as he tried to orient himself, mostly dressed in dark colored clothing. He recognized none of the fashions. He didn’t have time to dwell on that, however, because behind him Scott could hear the nurse suddenly speaking into what he could only presume was a radio, reporting that he was on the run.  


When several armed men turned from further down the hall and began to jog in his direction, Scott decided that probably meant he should actually be  _ on the run _ .   
  


So he turned and began to sprint along the corridor. He moved fast enough to blur past the people in his way, occasionally rebounding off of them with his hands outstretched.  Before any of the armed guard could come close to catching up with him, he’d found the first door and dashed out of it into the street.   
  


Everything continued to be  _ so wrong _ .   
  


It was too bright, lights and colors and noise  _ everywhere _ . There were more cars than Scott could have ever anticipated, all crowded into the streets, all streamlined and futuristic and unfamiliar. People filled every sidewalk, making difficult to flee, objecting in loud, familiar accents any time he jostled one of them. Yet still, beneath all of the panic and the sound and fury, he could recognize one very important truth.   
  


He was still in New York.   
  


Eventually, it all became too much. Scott felt he probably could have run forever, his body still fit and free of the asthma that had plagued his childhood. It wasn’t his body that couldn’t cope--it was his mind, overtaken by the unexplained changes in the world around him. He began to slow, first to a normal human’s pace and then even slower, finally lagging to a stop as he found himself in the center of Times Square.   
  


Scott was so taken in by the countless screens, moving with the sharpest film he’d ever seen, without projectors and in full life-life color, that he almost missed being surrounded by massive, sleek cars with tinted out windows.   
  


A solemn-faced black man with an eyepatch stepped out of the closest car, hands raised in a placating gesture. He looked calm and rational, but he was immediately flanked by obvious soldiers, so Scott was pretty sure the calm, beneficent appearance could turn around in an instant. The tang of wolfsbane in the air as the soldiers exited their vehicles was at least half the reason Scott didn’t just bolt a second time. “What’s going on?”   
  


“Captain McCall. We’re on your side. You are with friends, I assure you. There’s no need to run.” The man with the eyepatch was saying, his voice just as carefully and infuriatingly soothing as the nurse’s had been. “My name is Alan Deaton, I’m the Director of S.H.I.E.L.D. I’d just like to talk with you.”   
  


Scott frowned, curling his fingers up into his own palms to resist the temptation to pop out his claws and threaten with them. “If you’re on  _ my side _ , why the fake room? Why the deception?”   
  


Director Deaton’s expression tilted towards something closer to distress, but by the smallest increments. “We had hoped to break the news to you slowly.”   
  


Scott’s breathing caught in his throat. “What news?”   
  


“You’ve been asleep, Cap. For over seventy years.”   
  


His heart kicked, jumped in place, and felt like it had skipped several beats in a row. A trembling started in the small bones of Scott’s hands and started to work its way up through his arms, threatening to overtake his entire body. It sounded so impossible. How could anyone be asleep for over seventy years? Even if he could accept that, how could he have slept  _ that long _ and not seemed to age a day? Shouldn’t he be an old man now?   
  


He balked, opening his mouth to deny the idea, but instead Scott found himself taking in his surroundings again. All of the pulsing, too-bright lights, the loud sounds and strange clothing, everything that was intimately familiar and yet impossibly alien about the city he’d lived his entire life in. He  _ couldn’t _ deny it, as much as he wanted to, as much as even considering accepting the idea made something incredibly uncomfortable shift around in his chest.   
  


It had to be true. He was in the future.   
  


Alone.   
  


Some of the sudden helplessness he felt must have shown on his face, because something softened in Deaton’s expression when Scott looked up at him. He turned one hand over to make an inviting gesture, eyebrows lifting. “Come on. We have a lot to catch you up on, and a lot to talk about. I think you’re going to want to hear what I have to say.”   
  


Scott nodded, and shifted to follow this Director Deaton into his car. It wasn’t like he had any better ideas. With everything else stripped from him, Scott really had only one imperative left to him.

  
Keep moving forward.


	17. Chapter 17

It had been almost a month since Scott woke up in the S.H.I.E.L.D. ‘recovery room’. A month, which felt like an eternity, and yet not nearly enough time at all to get used to this new world he’d found himself in. It had taken at least a week for him to gain any sense of acceptance of it, to stop feeling a physical shock like a kick in the chest every time he went outside. Now it just felt like he was slowly drowning. Scott was fairly sure that wasn’t a result of the world’s changes.  


Director Deaton had given him an apartment in Brooklyn, assured him that S.H.I.E.L.D. would cover the cost of his living and eating indefinitely. That hadn’t settled very well with Scott, but in a time where literally nothing was settling well with him, he felt like he was learning to pick his battles. He allowed S.H.I.E.L.D. to pay for his housing and Scott tried to focus on getting everything else under control.  


Mostly that had meant a lot of restless walks around Brooklyn to catalogue all the ways it had changed, and late-night visits to a ‘private’ gym that was little more than a warehouse with an unutilized sparring ring and a seemingly endless supply of punching bags. He knew this because almost every night, when he couldn’t sleep, Scott found himself there, surrounded by echoes of the past. He’d hang a bag and abandon himself to the flashbacks, slamming his fist into the unyielding padding for every memory he couldn’t escape, every word that haunted him.  


Every time he saw Stiles’ face flash before his eyes, wide-eyed and terrified, endlessly falling.  


He broke three or four bags a night, doing that, usually simply by bursting their seams but occasionally with a dramatic spray of sand and cotton.  


It was one of _those_ nights that Director Deaton walked in, as if he had the keys to the front door. He probably _did_ , the more that Scott thought about it. He didn’t acknowledge Deaton as the man approached, instead focusing on keying down his breathing. By the time Deaton was only a few feet from him, Scott’s chest was no longer heaving, his hands had started to unclench from their desperate fists. They weren’t bleeding this time. That seemed like an improvement.  


“Having trouble sleeping, Captain McCall?” Deaton’s voice was calm and easy, but there was an edge of purpose that Scott could hear beneath it. He’d been left alone for an entire month after his orientation, without any indication that S.H.I.E.L.D. even existed other than the fact that there was always money in his account and utilities in his apartment.  


Scott looked down at the wreckage of the punching bag at his feet, and laughed a bitter, unamused laugh. “I think I’ve done my share of sleeping, sir. I’ll leave some for everyone else.”  


Deaton took another step forward, hands clasped neatly behind his back. He had something in them, but he didn’t carry it like it could pose a threat. It looked like it might be a folio of papers instead. “And you aren’t the partying type? Go out and celebrate that you’ve survived, that your war was won? It seems like a victory that you would want to savor.”  


A wince overtook Scott’s face, and he looked up to meet Deaton’s eyes since the first time the Director had entered the warehouse. “I guess part of it just doesn’t feel very real to me. For me, a month ago I was in the middle of the most vicious war the world had ever seen, and it didn’t show any signs of stopping. Now, I’m here, without ever seeing the resolution. This world is strange enough, I might as well be John Carter of Mars.”  


“You might as well be who?” Deaton prompted, eyebrows furrowing.  


“John Carter of--nevermind, it’s a book. I read a lot, before the war.” Scott sighed, turning to pace the warehouse a bit. Focusing on how out of time he was always stirred up feelings of helpless restlessness. “Are you here with a mission, sir?”  


Now, the folio of papers came forward, offered in Scott’s direction. “I am. Here.”  


Scott opened the folio to skim over the first few papers as Director Deaton stood by. The first sheet had a lot of information about something labeled the Tesseract, along with the image of a small cube glowing with a bright blue light. Scott had seen light like that before. “What’s this?”  


“The Argents didn’t have all of their eggs in a single basket.” Deaton explained, his eye on Scott’s face rather than on the information Scott was reviewing. “This is the Tesseract. It is an energy source of extraterrestrial origin and seemingly unlimited power. Talia Hale found it in the ocean while she was looking for you. She thought it might solve the world’s energy crisis. So did we, until it was stolen from us.”  


“This explains the weapons that the Argents had.” Scott decided after a short delay. “They fired a blue energy that looked almost exactly like the light this thing is putting off. Who stole it?”  


This time, Deaton’s mouth quirked, like he found something funny in the answer. “He calls himself Loki.”  


“After the Norse trickster god?”  


Deaton’s eyebrow lifted, which was as close as Scott had seen in their short interactions to Deaton looking impressed. “Not exactly. He _is_ the Norse trickster god.”  


Something in Scott’s mouth turned to ash. He closed the dossier suddenly. “Oh. _Great_.”  


“There’s a lot we need to catch you up on. I have a bird ready to take you to our rendez-vous point, if you’re in. We can go over the mission briefing on the way.” There was a certain amount of urgency under the calm level of Deaton’s voice, enough to make Scott pause in the act of handing the dossier back.  


He turned, then, to look down at the wrecked punching bag, and then up towards the direction of his dismal little apartment. He was well aware that was nothing important or personal in it, but he still prompted, out of some long-dormant habit, “Should I pack anything?”  


Deaton very kindly didn’t ask if Scott even _had_ anything worth packing, presumably because he also knew the answer was _no_. Instead, he inclined his head a little, lifting one hand towards the door in an inviting gesture. “S.H.I.E.L.D. will take care of it. Right now we shouldn’t be wasting too much time.”  


Part of him felt guilty leaving the bag in the middle of the floor, all of its guts spread out like someone had been trying to use them for divination. The rest of Scott just couldn’t rally enough to care; he’d never seen anyone else in the training area, and all of his messes had been cleaned up even after his inexpert attempts to fend for himself. Someone was probably being paid very well to keep everything in line. He made a mental note to ask Deaton to make sure they got a bonus.

  
He turned on his heel and followed Deaton out of the warehouse.


	18. Chapter 18

The ‘bird’ that Director Deaton had ready turned out to be a few blocks’ walk and on the top of an austere building, a small VTOL jet huddled onto a helipad that Scott had a sneaking suspicion was a secret from most of the city. Deaton led him inside where a blonde woman with bright lipstick and tumbling waves of hair waited behind the flight controls. She introduced herself as Agent Erica Reyes, something bright in her brown eyes, but Scott was too tired and too on edge to give it any thought. Instead, he buckled into a seat in the main compartment of the plane and accepted the tablet that Deaton handed him, full of mission-critical information.  


A lot of it appeared to be personnel dossiers, which Scott found of particular interest. He needed to know these people he was going to work with, needed to _understand_ them if he was going to do missions with them. He needed to be able to know he could trust them with his back. So he flicked through the information, squinting to read the small text until Deaton showed him how to zoom in with gestures.  


They were maybe fifteen minutes into the flight when Scott spoke up. “Derek _Hale_. Like... _Talia_ Hale, or is that a coincidence?”  


“He’s her son.” Deaton explained from across the cabin, his eyes more on Scott’s faec than on the information he was gleaning from the tablet. “He was a born wolf, not bitten. When his parents died, he took over their arms and tech company.”  


Scott frowned, faintly, looking at the bearded face on the tablet. He could see Talia in it, he decided, mostly around the eyes. “You say he’s a werewolf, but now he flies around in some kind of high-tech armor suit and calls himself _Iron Wolf_?”  


“It’s a long story.” Deaton sighed, making it clear he wasn’t about to explain it. “The short version is that there was an accident, and now he has a piece of shrapnel lodged near his heart. Normally that wouldn’t be that much of a problem, but it’s been laced with an incredibly powerful synthetic form of wolfsbane. All of his lycanthropic ability is focused on keeping him alive. He built the suit to compensate.”  


He supposed he could see the reason in that. After all, Scott had gone out of his way to achieve what Derek had been born with, simply on the basis that being as he’d _had been_ wasn’t enough to do enough good. He pursed his mouth in silence and turned to look at the next face in the list. He seemed like a nice enough young man, with bright blue eyes and a hesitant smile. Every image of him draped in a labcoat that almost seemed too big for him was a stark contrast to the pictures of the giant, green wolf-like creature that the kid apparently turned into.  


“So, Doctor Dunbar, here, was trying to replicate Talia’s Alpha serum?” Scott could hear the sadness in his own voice as he considered how terribly that appeared to have ended up for Liam Dunbar.  


“Everyone was.” Deaton confirmed, glancing once to Reyes before he focused on Scott again. “Dunbar thought maybe gamma radiation was the answer. It wasn’t. When he’s in control, however, he’s one of the most brilliant scientific minds on the planet. His assistance on this mission will be purely of that nature.”  


Something about that claim seemed disingenuous, but Scott ignored it, preferring to try and let it settle his nerves. He had no desire to go toe to toe with a twelve-foot-tall rage-fueled radioactive werewolf, after all.  


Besides that, the next name in the dossier caused Scott’s heart to clutch into a cold stone in his chest. “Allison _Argent?!_ ”  


Deaton nodded as if he had anticipated Scott’s reaction. Good. He should have. “Gerard’s granddaughter. I understand your reservations, Captain, but…”  


“It says here she was brainwashed by her family and spent years as an assassin to support their interests!”  


“It does. Because she was.” Deaton didn’t flinch, nor did he make any excuses or try to twist the context. Scott wasn’t sure that made it better, but he respected the straightforwardness, at least. “But she has recovered. She’s on our side, now, Scott.”  


It didn’t do anything to settle Scott’s misgivings. He didn’t like the implication that the Argents had continued to make trouble for the world after Gerard’s death, after everything that Scott had sacrificed to bring him down. He reached up to scrub at his face, dragging his fingers down against his eyes and over his mouth.  


From the front of the quinjet, Agent Reyes’ voice spoke up, confident and clear. “I’ve been personally involved in Black Widow’s deprogramming from the beginning. I can vouch for her, and for her dedication to righting her family’s wrongs.”  


Scott considered the back of Reyes’ head for a long time. He wanted to tell her that he wasn’t particularly reassured by her words, because he didn’t really know _her_ either, but he knew that wouldn’t achieve anything. At some level, no amount of reading files and staring at profile pictures was going to make him feel settled about having a new team to work with. All that would do that was time and familiarity. He had to extend a little trust.  


He had to keep moving forward.  


Scott kept his head down, staring at the contents of the tablet without really reading anything else.  Minutes passed before Deaton stood and moved to stand behind Agent Reyes, telling her in low tones that he’d take over the controls to bring them in through the last distance to the base. She seemed to know exactly what those worst really meant, because it wasn’t long before she’d moved seats, coming to buckle herself in next to Scott.  


“I watched you, you know. While you were sleeping.” The first words that she said were so completely bold and _explicit_ , they gave Scott little to no comfort. Maybe _little_ comfort, because they _did_ give him a _little_ comfort, in that they reminded him of the way Stiles would approach uncomfortable conversations; with no awareness that they were uncomfortable. Scott wondered if Stiles and Agent Reyes would have gotten along.  


He supposed it didn’t matter. He lifted his eyebrows and _looked_ at her, expecting there to be a point to her comment other than awkwardness.  


She seemed to catch on a moment later, her own eyebrows spiking. “Oh, _oh_ , no, not like that. It was my job to help ensure you came out of cryo without any damage. I found it more interesting to sit in the room with you and read than watch you through a screen. It felt more personal, and besides, I’m a big fan of your work.”  


“My _work_?” Scott echoed, incredulous and skeptical. He didn’t think he had much _work_ for anyone to even know about, much less be a fan of.  


“Oh yeah.” Erica assured him, voice warm. “My Mom used to tell me the stories. The scrappy Latino kid from Brooklyn who fought so hard against the injustices of the Nazis? Who took down the whole Argent bloc single-handedly?”  


Scott could feel his face flushing with color, not all of it due to being embarrassed. “It wasn’t _single-handed_.”  


She nodded, eyes wide with sympathy, and moved one hand like she might have patted his knee, if she’d let himself. “I know that now. But at the time, I didn’t. All I knew that there was something a little bit like me who was willing to stand up for what was right. It was inspiring. You were basically the first _superhero_. To have you on the team now will make such a difference.”  


Scott felt a little dizzy, something clenching in his stomach. He didn’t feel like a hero, much less a _super_ one. “I hope I live up to your expectations, Agent Reyes.”  


Erica’s smile was dazzling, confident in every way. “Oh, you will. And you’ll look amazing doing it, because we redesigned your uniform. Just a little. Not too much. It’s still very American, I felt like that was important.”  


“You didn’t think that uniform was a little _old-fashioned_?”  


Agent Reyes only laughed, like the whole conversation was amusing her. “I think maybe people could _use_ a little _old-fashioned_ right now. You’ll see.”  


Deaton cleared his voice from the pilot’s seat, interrupting what was left of their conversation. “We’re here. Prepare yourself for landing.”  


Scott twisted himself around in his seat to look out of the window, only to be met with the vision of the endless, roiling expanse of the Atlantic ocean. He frowned, but the further into the VTOL that the quinjet got, the closer they got to what was beneath them. Gradually Scott realized that there was an aircraft carrier out in the middle of the ocean, and they were perching carefully on one corner of it like a seagull.  


Eventually, they were on the dubiously more stable platform of the carrier, the quinjet’s engines powering down with a high-pitched whine that Scott doubted either Director Deaton or Agent Reyes could actually hear. Hydraulics added their hissing as the gangplank on the back of the jet dropped.  


Standing neatly at the end of it, as if she knew exactly how much space it needed to the centimeter, was a tall woman with her brown hair cut into a neat bob that waved at the edges. She was striking, surrounded by an air of confidence, of _competence_. She may have been one of the most beautiful women that Scott had ever seen. For just a moment, he couldn’t breathe for looking at her.

  
She smiled, which made it worse, and then extended her hand to shake and said the worst thing of all, “Captain McCall, it’s nice to meet you. I’m Agent Argent.”


	19. Chapter 19

Scott forced himself to swallow back all the bitterness and bile that name carried for him, and walked to the end of the gangplank to shake _Agent Argent_ ’s hand. If he was expected to be civil, he’d damn well be civil, despite the misgivings that stirred in his chest. She was supposedly on the side of the angels, or at least his _allies_. He had to be gracious. “Likewise, ma’am.”  


Her face travelled through a theatrical wince that echoed the animation of someone Scott had left far behind him, head shaking. “You don’t need to call me _ma’am_. Just Allison is fine.”  


Scott wasn’t sure he was comfortable with _just Allison_ , or really if he understood most of his reaction at all, but he nodded as if he did.  


Deaton came down to the end of the gangplank with as inscrutable an expression as he’d ever shown in the time Scott had known him. It was completely unclear whether he was disappointed or pleased with the way Scott’s introduction to the first of his new teammates was going. Instead, he spoke softly, mostly to Allison, although he was careful to keep Scott included in the atmosphere of the conversation. “Agent Argent. Reyes and I are needed on the bridge. I was hoping you’d introduce Captain McCall here to Doctor Dunbar and get everyone ready for departure? We’ll be leaving shortly.”  


Allison responded with a broad, bright smile. “Of course.”  


Without any other pretense, Scott was left alone with the granddaughter of his greatest enemy to date and her disarming, cheerful smile.  


If she were at all aware of Scott’s discomfort, she wasn’t acknowledging it. Instead, Allison turned and gestured easily with one hand, indicating the broad, open space of the aircraft carrier’s deck. There were people bustling over almost every inch of it, moving gear inside the enclosed part of the top deck or securing the Quinjet after its flight. Only one of them seemed to be unconcerned with the business of running an aircraft carrier. He was an unassuming man, shorter than Scott, dressed in pressed trousers and a button-down purple shirt, a far cry from the sleek dark S.H.I.E.L.D. uniforms everyone else seemed to be wearing.  


As they grew closer, Scott recognised him from the debriefing videos as Liam Dunbar.  


Allison nudged Scott towards Dunbar without actually touching him, somehow, her hand extended towards Doctor Dunbar. “Doctor Dunbar, can I introduce you to Captain McCall?”  


‘Doctor Dunbar’ turned slowly, dragging his eyes away from the endless rolling blue at the edge of the carrier to instead fix them on Scott. The smile he offered just seemed more weary than anything, but his handshake was firm. “Good to meet you, Captain.”  


Scott could tell that Liam was uncomfortable, restless in a way that had nothing to do with Scott, personally, and everything to do with the setting. He’d read about Liam’s relationship with the entity the files called ‘The Hulk’, whom everyone--including Liam himself--seemed to speak of as if it were a separate creature. He could see, in Liam’s eyes and the way he tended to avoid eye _contact_ , that Liam was all too-aware of his reputation and was just waiting for it to slap him in the face.  


So instead, Scott made a thoughtful noise in the back of his throat and mentioned, “Director Deaton’s notes said you were a nuclear physicist. He seemed to think that would help us find the Tesseract.”  


Surprise flickered across Liam’s expression, edging it closer towards something more relaxed. Scott felt it was a tiny victory, the kind of thing he’d started keeping track of, after they began to prove fewer and further between. “That’s right. It appears to be putting off a unique kind of radiation. I’m hoping that with the right equipment and coordination we should be able to triangulate it. I’m--”  


Liam’s explanation was cut through by a loud, obnoxious alarm that started to wail over the flight deck, bouncing off of the waves and coming back at them in an equally obnoxious echo. He flinched, one hand curling into a loose fist, and for the first time since he woke up, Scott realized how _naked_ he felt without his shield.  


Again, somehow, it was Allison who didn’t flinch or even seem the least bit concerned. She looked back over her shoulder at the alarm, and pursed her mouth. “We should get inside. The flight deck isn’t the most hospitable place when we’re underway.”  


The deck beneath their feet shuddered, the sound of machinery working and grinding against itself more coming up through the carrier itself than the air. Water rushed and surged on the side, and almost as if he couldn’t help himself, Scott inched closer to the edge of the carrier. The ocean next to it was frothing, bubbling almost as if it was boiling, and Scott couldn’t tear his eyes away from it.  


Gradually, something rose up out of the water itself, whirring to life. It appeared to be an enormous turbine, big enough to dominate almost an entire fourth of the whole ship. The wind began to stir as the turbine started to power up, and Scott was immediately gripped with the urgent need to be _very far_ from this thing before it got spinning up to speed and he risked being sucked into it just to be pureed into so much red spray.  


Allison and Liam seemed to share his notion of going _inside_ , albeit somewhat less urgently. They turned to walk to the interior of the carrier, Liam leaning in towards Allison with an intense, unhappy tilt to his voice. “Is this thing going to go _underwater_?”  


“Nope. Other way. It goes _up_.” Her response seemed _far too amused_ to match the small sound of disbelieving horror Liam made.  


“ _Great_. This is the _worst_ idea.”  


No one had anything to say in response to Liam’s pessimism, so they grew silent as Allison led them to the bridge of the carrier and the _carrier_ made progress on the promise of carrying them aloft.  


The carrier’s bridge, as it turned out, was simultaneously immensely impressive and also exactly what Scott had come to expect from military design with something to prove. It was circular, more or less, with a meeting table at the back of a room otherwise dominated by two levels of workstations, blue-and-steel tinted screens, and windows. The windows took up the front third of the room, giving an impressive view of the sky and the ocean as it dropped rapidly away; there was even a circular section of glass flooring at the very tip of the room that seemed to be designed exclusively to give the S.H.I.E.L.D. agents with less concrete constitutions a nervous fit.  


Naturally, that was precisely where Director Deaton was standing when Allison led them into the room.  


He turned slowly, giving the small group time to take in the grand expanse of the room. Scott wasn’t impressed. Instead, he found his attention grabbed by the screens suspended over the meeting table. They were displaying a great many things, some video footage, some maps, some text he couldn’t read from a distance, and Agent Reyes was frowning at them, bottom lip poked out in something like a pout. On the screen in front of her as a short video loop of a sandy-haired man with a vacant expression in a S.H.I.E.L.D. uniform.  


“Doctor Dunbar.” Deaton called as he closed the distance to the table, tone warm and welcoming and not at all as if Liam were standing there, visibly unsettled by the entire proceedings. “I’m glad you could make it.”  


“I’m glad this wasn’t an invitation for the other guy.” Liam said, darkly, before flicking his eyes way from Deaton to focus on the screens in front of Erica. “Captain McCall said something about tracking the cube by a radioactive signature. Have you gotten very far?”  


The director’s expression was grim as he shook his head. “Not far or fast enough. We’ve been sweeping wirelessly connected devices, but there’s so many of them it’s been incredibly slow. We can’t afford to take as much time as it’s been taking.”  


Liam nodded, his attention still on the screens. “Call everyone you know who has a spectrometer, tell them to put it as high as they can get it, and set it to scan for gamma radiation. If you have a workstation I can use, I can set up an algorithm and at least narrow our search field a little.”  


Deaton turned to Allison without hesitation. “Agent Argent, if you would show Doctor Dunbar to the lab, we could get started on that. Time is of the essence.”  


Allison’s smile was familiar and warm, the kind of smile for close friends. “Come on, Liam, we have a whole playground for you.”  


They left the bridge, talking amongst themselves. Deaton turned to call over an Agent Romero, leaving Scott alone with Erica and her screens. Scott leaned in a little, pointing out the man he’d seen earlier. “Who is this? He’s wearing one of your uniforms.”  


Erica grimaced, glancing at Scott with an expression that made it clear she’d rather he hadn’t asked that question. “That’s Isaac Lahey. Codename Hawkeye. He’s one of our special agents, a little like you, but without all the fancy super serum stuff and _with_ a very high-tech bow. He was with Director Deaton when Loki captured the Tesseract. He appears to be under some sort of mind control. Until we can break him free of it, he is an ally of Loki and an extreme threat.”  


Something cold and dreadful clutched at Scott’s chest as he stared at the image of the man, his eyes somehow glowing an eerie blue and yet almost dead at the same time. He was unsettled, deep to his bones, at the very idea that his allies could be so corrupted, almost overwhelmed with a desire to _fix it_ , and yet all he could force out of his tight throat was a quiet, “...acknowledged.”  


Agent Reyes looked up and considered Scott’s expression for a long time. Either she found what she was looking for or she didn’t--it wasn’t clear--but either way she pushed back from the table to stand, her voice softer. “Come on. I’ve got something to show you.”  


She led him out of the bridge and down the corridors of the carrier, down a flight of stairs that was almost the first thing that looked like the same militaristic utilitarianism that he’d become familiar with during the fight against the Nazis. They travelled down another hallway until finally they came to a stop at a nondescript, unremarkable closed door. Erica paused, there, with her hand on the handle, brown eyes baleful as she looked back at Scott. “I know you’d rather it wasn’t this way, but it’s best if I get this into your hands as soon as possible.”  


Erica opened the door into what looked almost like a shrine.  


Scott knew it couldn’t actually _be_ a shrine, because there was no way that he could accept there being a shrine to _him_.  


The room itself was small, shaped like a leaf or maybe like a spearhead. Along the walls were various artifacts from his life, many of them pictures. Scott couldn’t really find it in him to look at them for too long. Too many showed Stiles’ smiling face in black and white, wedged into the frame next to Scott himself. If he stared at them too long, he’d end up spending too many hours trying to recall the exact color of Stiles whiskey-flavored eyes, or the precise timber of his voice.  


Besides that, Scott was far too distracted by the centerpiece; a giant case that seemed to belong in a museum, proudly putting his uniform and shield on display for an empty room.  


Erica had been truthful, there had been changes made to the uniform. Scott was sure that some of them were functional, but most of what he could see was that the design had been streamlined, most of the buckles and straps that had dominated it in yesteryear incorporated into the lining of the uniform itself. It was brighter, more vibrant, the star in the middle of the chest shimmering with metallic thread, and all Scott could think the more that he looked at it was that it was _a better target_.  


Then again, he didn’t know what he’d expected after he’d let them paint a bullseye on his shield.  


He was jarred out of his somewhat maudlin thoughts by the sound of of a muffled voice sounding in Erica’s earpiece. She listened, and Scott listened too, but he couldn’t work out exactly what was being said, only that she put her fingers to her ear to transmit and responded with, “Understood.”

  
She looked at the uniform, and then at Scott, and nodded. “Suit up, Captain. We already got a hit.”


	20. Chapter 20

Getting back into the uniform felt more like putting on a yolk than Scott had anticipated. At the same time, it was oddly liberating; it was a burden, surely, but it was also something he _knew_ , something he was familiar with in a world of fundamentally unfamiliar things. As soon as he was suited up, he met Allison at the Quinjet. Her uniform was sleek, functional, and _dark_ , a dramatic contrast to the bright colors Scott was wearing. The only spot of color on her was a small red hourglass marking on her belt buckle, which Scott recognized as a nod to her codename. _The Black Widow_.

 

He didn’t want to think too hard about how she’d gotten that name.  


Instead, Scott tried to focus on the mission briefing that Deaton offered tersely over the radio as the quinjet sped along its way. They’d picked up the tesseract’s signal in Germany, which somehow felt appropriate to Scott. The jet went at an unreal, almost unholy pace, but even considering how quickly they were moving, there were updates to the situation radioed in every few moments. Loki was assaulting a gala at a museum in Stuttgart for reasons that were still unclear to S.H.I.E.L.D. By the time Scott and Allison were closing in on the location in the quinjet, the attendees of the gala had been gathered outside of the museum, where Loki was standing before them pontificating.  


“He’s subjugating them.” Allison said as she swung the quinjet closer. They could see the scene, now, through the front windscreen, although if she brought the craft any closer she risked Loki noticing them. She flicked a look to Scott over her shoulder, face grim. “They’re always subjugating somebody. You think if I dropped you off here you could make yourself a big star-spangled distraction so I can get a better vantage point?”  


Scott gave a low, dry snort from the front of his mouth. “That seems to be my specialty.”  


Allison skidded the quinjet around behind one of the neighboring buildings and dropped the back hatch down so that Scott could jump down onto the pavement below. The air was crisp, cool, and if it wasn’t sharp with electric power and the scent of human fear, it might have been the kind of night that Scott enjoyed. As it was, he could _feel_ the terror of the people kneeling before Loki, and it made the hair on the back of his neck and his arms rise. He turned on his heel and immediately began loping towards the conflict.  


As he grew closer, he could hear the voices of those assembled, Loki’s booming and self-important in a way Scott had already heard too much of. “There are no men like me!”  


An older man’s voice, weary but defiant through all of that weariness, like an ancient dam, “There are _always_ men like you.”  


Some unseen force shifted in the air, and Scott went from a lope to a full-on sprint, nimbly dodging his way through the crowd assembled in front of Loki towards the lone standing man. Loki spoke again, but Scott was paying no attention to it, too focused on the way he lifted the scepter in his hand, the way that blue light began gathering at the end of it.  


Scott knew what that light was. He’d seen it in the weapons of the Argent forces during the War. He knew what it could do to a man.  


Which was why he lept forward, inserting his shield between the bolt of energy and the man at the last possible moment. It reflected off of the very middle of the curve and went right back the way it came, catching Loki under the chin and throwing him back off of his feet.  


It very distinctly did _not_ blow a hole in Loki’s head the size of a softball as it would have the old man. Scott took particular note of that.  


“You should be careful where you point that thing,” Scott scolded as he straightened, letting his voice ring out over the assembled. “You could hurt somebody with it.”  


There was something unnatural and fluid about the way Loki regained his feet. He stood with his head cocked to the side, sweeping over the figure Scott cut in his uniform with sharp, discompassionate blue eyes. “ _Ah_. I had _heard_ of you Americans. Always showing up where you don’t belong.”  


Scott could hear the hypersonic whine of the quinjet’s VTOL thrusters behind him and he knew without looking that Allison was on the verge of maneuvering it back around. He smiled, soft and benign, but never took his eyes off of Loki nor lowered his shield from its guard position. “ _Funny_. I’m pretty sure _you_ don’t belong here, either.”  


The quinjet slid into the very edge of Scott’s peripheral vision. Allison’s voice crackled over the exterior intercom, all business and hard edges. “Loki, drop the weapon and stand down.”  


There was no part Scott that was surprised when Loki did no such thing. Instead, he raised his scepter again and fired a narrow blast of blue light towards the quinjet and Allison within it. Allison easily avoided the shot, but the interaction had Loki so distracted, a vicious sort of glee on his face, that Scott saw his opportunity open itself up.  


He turned his shield sideways and _heaved_ it at Loki with all of his Alpha strength.  


It made a satisfying low-pitched gong of sound as it rebounded off of Loki’s gaudy helmet. It didn't knock him silly like Scott had been hoping, so instead he caught the shield on its way back to him and heaved _himself_ at Loki bodily.  


Loki, as it turned out, was _fast_ , and he was _strong_. He was easily, unquestionably, the fastest, strongest opponent Scott had ever fought. Worse still, he was experienced, familiar with combat in a way Scott just wasn't. Scott lunged forward with his claws out and Loki caught his ankles with the butt of his scepter, knocking Scott off of his feet in one neat sweep. He turned his scepter over faster than should have been possible, giving Scott no time to kip up before Loki drove the blade down with killing force. Scott barely managed to roll out of the way, the scepter blade drawing sparks from his shield instead.  


Scott turned in the middle of his roll, twisting until he went over his own shoulder and ended up on his feet again. He lunged with his shield, only to be parried to the side. He tried to use the momentum from that to slash his claws across Loki’s face, but Loki only dodged backwards, using the butt-end of his staff to shove Scott back to the ground. “You don’t learn very quickly, do you?”  


Growling, Scott stood right back up. “I learn fast enough. I already know everything I need to know about _you_.”  


Every time that Scott found his feet again, Loki knocked them out from under him. He spent most of the fight on the ground, clearly and painfully outmatched in the realm of hand-to-hand. That didn’t matter to Scott. All that mattered was that as long as he kept getting back up, Loki was focused on _him_ , and not on the crowd of innocent people gathered behind them.  


All he had to do was keep this going long enough to get Allison a clear shot.  


That wasn’t exactly what _happened_.  


Instead of a precision strike aimed to eliminate Loki as a threat on the field, what actually came out of the quinjet was a sudden barrage of _music_. Loud music, with a lot of distortion. Scott didn’t recognize the song, but he knew enough to know that this was the kind of music that had evolved after he’d gone under the ice. _Rock_ , someone had called it. This particular song Scott would have also described as _obnoxious_.  


It did a good job of masking the hypersonic whine of plasma rockets until they were practically on top of the battleground.  


An armored suit moving at incredible speed skimmed in low over the heads of the kneeling crowd, seemingly out of nowhere. It grabbed Loki around the waist in a football tackle and then abruptly changed direction, spiraling both the so-called god and itself in a corkscrew upwards hundreds of feet. Just as suddenly as it had gone _up_ , the sudden then decided to come _down_ , Loki-first, into the concrete steps leading up into the museum. Scott had to duck behind the shelter of his shield to avoid being pummeled by the shrapnel that exploded outwards from the point of impact.  


When the dust cleared, there was the power suit, towering over Loki as he lay, rumpled but hardly beaten, in the crater they’d just created. The suit was bristling with armament, glowing menacingly at key points on the faceplate, chest, and palms. Every single piece of firepower it seemed to possessed was very clearly trained on Loki.  


There was a tinny quality to the voice that came out of the suit, too-casual. “I’m up for round two if you are.”  


To Scott’s surprise, Loki lifted his hands in a slow, deliberate gesture of surrender. The grandiose horned helmet and the armor he’d cloaked himself in dissolved into motes of light and magic and faded away.  


“Good choice.” The man in the suit approved. He didn’t put any of his weaponry away, but he did tip his head to the side so that the glowing panels of his eyes were more or less pointed at Scott. Now that he wasn’t moving, Scott could see that the helmet of his power armor had small molded ears, like a wolf’s. “I can’t believe you two were having a party and didn’t invite me.”  


Over the quinjet’s external speaker, Allison’s voice crackled through a humorless laugh. “It was a little last minute, _sorry_.”  


Scott felt a strange, sudden impulse to remind them that he was even _there_. He sidled a step closer to the man he knew to go by _Iron Wolf_ , and cleared his throat. “Mr. Hale.”  


_Now_ , that faceplate was _definitely_ pointed in Scott’s direction. “Captain. Let’s get our little trophy bundled up for shipping and into your plane. Deaton’s got a lot of questions for this guy.”  


Of that, Scott was certain. Still, turning back to look at Loki as he waited to be loaded into the quinjet, he couldn’t help but feel disquiet. There was something about the slight, tight-lipped smile and the sharpness of Loki’s blue eyes that made Scott feel like somehow, they hadn’t actually _thwarted_ anything.  



	21. Chapter 21

Nothing about this situation felt right.  


Thunder rolled outside as the quinjet flew through the first vestiges of a growing storm. It overshadowed the almost inaudible whine of the jet’s engines, and somehow at the same time underpinned how utterly _quiet_ the interior of the jet was. There had been a brief conversation between Allison and Director Deaton, but as soon as she’d acknowledged their orders to return to base immediately, she’d lapsed into a silence that since lasted.  


Loki sat in the back of the cabin, bound by his hands. It seemed woefully inadequate in terms of containing a man the others continually described as _a god_ , but so far it was working. Their prisoner sat and _watched_ with too-sharp eyes and said nothing at all. He gave Scott the impression that he was utterly in control and it made something in Scott’s mind _itch_.  


Next to Loki was Derek Hale, the faceplate of his armor tipped up to expose his features. Scott could see a lot of Talia in them, especially in the shape of his cheekbones and the darkness of what hair was visible under the helmet. He had scrounged up what looked to be a protein bar from somewhere, and looked like he had no cares in the entire world as he chewed through it. He noticed Scott looking and tilted it towards him like Derek was offering a bite, but Scott waved the offer off. His stomach was right enough in knots as it was.  


“It’s good.” Derek assured, casually like he had nothing invested in whether Scott liked the protein bar or not, even as he went back to eating it. “Unless you don’t like peanuts and chocolate. You allergic to peanuts?”  


“Not that I’m aware of.” Scott responded, feeling as terse as he sounded. He wasn’t interested in discussing candy bars when they had a prisoner _right there_ , imperfectly restrained. Loki looked, somehow, less confident and comfortable than he had before, a faint edge of tension entering his shoulders and his scent. Scott was determined to figure out why.  


Of course, it was difficult to focus on that when Derek kept _talking_. “Even a Super Alpha like you needs to worry about nutrition. And hydration. When was the last time you had some water? I mean _other_ than the several hundred feet of water you were covered in for decades.”  


Any reply Scott could have given, less patient than the last, was interrupted by a peel of thunder that shuddered physically through the frame of the quinjet. Loki’s head snapped suddenly to the side, his eyes considering the windows of the jet with apprehension. Scott frowned as understanding started to dawn on him, in too-small pieces and too late. “...are you afraid of lightning?”  


There was just the tiniest point of latency in the way Loki’s eyes moved back to Scott. “Not _exactly_.”  


As if it were the punctuation on the end of Loki’s sentence, something slammed into the quinjet amidst a blinding flash of light. Allison made a frustrated, distressed noise that Scott felt was probably meant to be a warning like _buckle in_ or _hold on_ , a warning that none of the men in the cabin behind her took care to obey. The quinjet fishtailed through the air as she struggled to get it back under control.  


The back hatch of the quinjet abruptly began to open, leaving Scott scrambling to grab hold of one of the harnesses he probably should have been strapped into hours ago. As he struggled to keep himself in the plane through the winds now tearing through the cabin, a woman appeared at the end of the hatch, flying through the air with a _warhammer_ of all things held out in front of her. Behind her, a dark red cape whipped through the wind, and all in all the vision was itself so incredulous Scott had half a second’s thought that he was just imagining it.  


Derek stood up, letting the last of his protein bar far from his hands and out of the jet. His other hand lifted towards his facemask.  


Before either of them could protest, the woman reached out and grasped Loki by the front of his shirt and collar. She _growled_ into his face, holding him close to her body as she whipped her hammer in a tight circle. It only took her a few seconds to get it moving fast enough that the metal sang, and then the hammer flew right back out of the plane, dragging the woman and Loki with it.  


Either the relative silence that followed was deafening, or the wind still roaring into the plane was.  


“... _That_ just happened.” Derek was just loud enough to hear, drawing Scott’s eyeline. He had already dropped his faceplate down, the eyes of the Iron Wolf glowing a radiant blue as he started towards the open hatch. “That’s okay. I can happen, too.”  


“What are you doing?!” Scott shouted after him, fumbling to get an arm free to start reaching for one of the quinjet’s parachute packs. “Are you going _out there_?”  


“I don’t have any idea who Hammer Time out there is, but what I _do_ know is that we need that Tesseract, and to get the Tesseract we need _Loki_ , and she just took Loki. I’m going to go take him back.” Derek turned, strode confidently to the end of the gangplank, and jumped off.  


The surge of frustration that Scott felt over being so effectively cut off from a critically important conversation was enormous. He steadied himself in the cabin and then let go of the harness, only to pull the parachute closer to him with altogether too much added strength. He had to take a moment to make sure he was calm enough not to puncture it with his claws.  


“You’re not thinking about following him, are you, Cap? This is a pretty high-grade fight, even for someone like you.” Allison’s voice came from the pilot seat, where she’d finally leveled the jet out.  


“Of course I am.” Scott said, short and sharp-edged, checking over the buckles of the parachute harness with as much attention as he could afford to give it. “We’re supposed to be a team. Besides, as much as it really annoys me, he was right.”  


Allison snorted, glancing briefly over her shoulder at Scott. Her expression was deeply wry. “You’ll find that happens a lot with Hale.”  


Scott humored her with a humorless snort, and without another word, followed Derek’s path into the open night sky.  


He’d expected rain, but for all the clouds, there was none. There was something strangely peaceful about hurtling through the air at ridiculous speed, keeping his body streamlined until he burst through the cloud over and could see the scenery below. Scott knew very well it was risky at best to parachute in the dark, and he wasn’t made any happier to see that the ground below was carpeted in a thick forest. The outlines of the trees were blurry and indistinct from this distance, even to his Alpha eyes.

  
Scott had wanted to freefall for as long as possible, in an attempt to catch up to the magical flying woman and the man with the _rocket-powered armor suit_ , but it just wasn’t going to be possible. He’d be good to no one with a tree through his gut. Instead, he deployed his parachute well above the treeline and did his best to steer to a safe clearing to land.  


At the very least, he had no question of where the others had gone. The battle that had apparently resulted between the woman with the hammer and the Iron Wolf was full of light and lightning, easily spotted from what felt like miles away.  The closer he drifted, the more he could hear it, the more the world became real again and Scott realized he needed to navigate his landing and catch up with Iron Wolf and the mysterious woman. The only real problem was that they kept _moving_ through the forest, rebounding through the trees in serpentine lines and circles. There was no way to plan his trajectory to land where they were, because _where they were_ kept moving.  


Somehow, through a combination of keen senses and divine intervention, he made it to the ground. Scott scrambled at the harness of the parachute as soon as he was on the ground, releasing himself from its dead weight so that he could immediately start sprinting, tracking the fight through the pitch-dark trees by the light, by the roar, by the scent of ozone that followed the lightning and Derek’s repulsor beams.  


When he finally caught up with them and clambered up the crest of the hill, Scott became sharply aware that he’d missed most of the party. Both the woman and Iron Wolf looked _haggered_ , the woman breathing heavily and Derek’s armor scuffed and carbon-scored. They’d clearly already gone three rounds and were readying for round four. There was no way he was going to get physically between them before they started fighting again, and the speed at which they moved made Scott worry that if they _did_ , he’d never catch up. He had no other solutions to the problem.  


He threw his shield as hard as he could manage in a vicious arc. It hit the woman in her midsection and threw her backward, just to rebound precisely as it needed to in order to slap across the Iron Wolf’s faceplate. Just as precisely, it came swinging back around to his hand, where Scott caught it without thought. “Knock it off!”  


An air of anticipation suddenly hung over the clearing. Both of the others turned to stare at Scott, as if he were the thing they could have least expected to interrupt them. He took a few seconds to breathe before turning his attention to the woman. “Why are you here? What are you _doing_?”  


She growled her words out with just as much obvious frustration as she’d shown when she’d taken Loki from the quinjet. “I’m here to _stop Loki_. I’m not here to bother with you people at all.”  


“Okay.” Scott accepted, nodding his head once. “How about a gesture of goodwill? Put the hammer down.”  


Immediately, Derek began to object, but Scott never got a chance to even process what he was saying, because the moment he _started_ , the woman snarled and batted Iron Wolf aside with her hammer as casually as she might have a gnat. She turned towards Scott, starting to run in a low, dangerous-looking lope, the hammer held loose by her side. “You want me to put the hammer _down?_ ”  


She leapt into the air, and Scott saw her coming as if in slow motion.  


The act wouldn’t have seemed nearly so threatening, given his own enhanced strength and healing, except that he’d just seen the casual, almost lazy way she’d dealt with Derek, without putting any effort into it. This blow was coming down from on high, clearly powered not only by the weight of her body but with some kind of righteous fury Scott could only guess was really mean for Loki, and maybe Derek, but not for him. He knew there would be nothing _casual_ or _nonthreatening_ about it.  


Scott took a knee, raising his shield above his ducked head just as the woman came down upon him. Her hammer struck a blow as if it were an anvil.  


The sound that resulted was like the tolling of some great, terrible bell. It blew Scott’s eardrums out and then expanded into a furious, blinding light and sound, too powerful to be contained. It started from the shield and rolled out into the forest into an enormous shockwave, tearing through the trees. For a few agonizing seconds, Scott couldn’t hear, couldn’t see, could only tell that it was _over_ when the shield stopped humming against his arm.  


Gradually, his senses returned, and Scott struggled to his feet.  


The forest around them had been utterly devastated in a wide radius. The trees were shredded, torn from their roots, and pulverized dust slowly settled back to the forest floor like mist. Scott could feel the blood running down the sides of his face from his ears, but he was at least mollified to see that the woman seemed just as shocked at the result as he was.  


He also noticed that she seemed to have been blown yards away by the force of the blast.  


“Are you finished?” Scott wheezed, blinking sweat and grime out of his eyes. “Because I really, _really_ hope you’re finished. I have a feeling we’re not actually on opposite sides here, and the longer we take to figure this out, the longer Loki has to figure out how to escape. I don’t think _any_ of us want _that_.”

  
The woman looked at her hammer. She looked back over her shoulder to where Derek had ended up, tangled in the wreckage of trees. She looked back to Scott, and finally lowered the weapon from the ready. “We’re finished. But I’m coming with you.”


	22. Chapter 22

Allison brought the quinjet in, skating over the tops of the trees until she found the clearing that had been blasted into existence by the collision between the hammer and the shield. The expression she wore as they boarded was unmistakable: she was _absolutely_ judging them for what they’d done to the treeline. Her voice was just as dry and unimpressed when they got inside, “This forest is a World Heritage Site, you know.”  


Derek looked back over the wreckage, tapping his faceshield up so that his own unimpressed expression was clearly visible regarding the vanishing image of the forest as the gangplank rose up. “Well, now it’s a _flat_ World Heritage Site.”  


The back hatch sealed behind them with a hiss, and the quinjet’s engines whined as they lifted off again. The atmosphere in the back of the plane wasn’t any more relaxed than it had been before, with Loki bound and cornered by the ferocious glare of the woman with the hammer. They wouldn’t make it back to the helicarrier with the tension straining the walls of the quinjet and the volatile personalities squeezed inside. Scott had to do _something_.  


He glanced towards Derek, and then towards Loki, hoping his meaning would be understood. It seemed to be, because Derek nodded in return, moving to put himself close enough to Loki that he could intervene if something happened. It hadn’t been very effective earlier, but Scott also couldn’t afford to give up on the notion of tactics entirely, in favor of paranoia.  


Scott moved to sit next to the woman, tipping his face up towards hers until she seemed to get the idea that she should be sitting down. Scott smiled when she claimed a seat next to him, even if she still kept her eyes mostly on Loki. “My allies call me Captain America, but my name is Scott McCall. If you’re going to work with us, we’ll need something to call _you_.”  


Slowly, the woman turned her face towards Scott and looked at him, as if for the first time. There was something fierce and wild in her expression, although Scott could tell that ferocity and the danger it promised wasn’t _for him_ , precisely. It was more likely he’d get caught in it as an unintended consequence, the same way careless or unfortunate people got struck by lightning in the middle of a storm. The storm did _mean_ to, it was simply the storm’s nature.

“My name is Thor.” She explained after a moment, gesturing to her hammer as if that explained it.  


Scott had read a few stories of the Norse pantheon, so it more or less _did_. He didn’t know whether or not to be a little worried that all of this was starting to make a certain amount of sense. “Oh. I...I apologize, I thought _Thor_ was...uh. A man.”  


It wasn’t clear whether it was anger or an equally ferocious amusement that lit up Thor’s eyes. “Perhaps once, or in your stories. The hammer chooses. If you are worthy to wield it, and _do_ wield it, than you are Thor. If you become unworthy, you are Thor no longer, and the hammer chooses someone who _is_ worthy.”  


Scott bit at his lip briefly, mulling the information over. “So it’s like my codename. Anyone could put on my uniform and hold my shield, and be Captain America, I suppose. But even when I’m not being Captain America, I’m still _Scott_. Have you got a name _besides_ Thor?”  


Her eyebrows furrowed. “I’ve always _been_ Thor, for longer than your mortal kind has memory. But…I suppose there have been times where I have had cause to walk amongst you and not be known for my power. In those times, I have been known as Malia.”  


“Malia.” Scott repeated, allowing himself a small smile. “I like that. It's a good name. Are you from the same place as Loki?”  


“We come from Asgard.” Malia confirmed, looking back to Loki with a hardening in her gaze. “He is my uncle. He is also a traitor, a liar. He must be tried in Asgard for his crimes.”  


From across the fuselage where he sat flanking Loki, Derek made a wry snort of sound. “Well, now, that is going to be a problem, because your Loki has this _cube_ that we _really_ need back. Until he gives up where it _is_ , we can't exactly let you take him anywhere.”  


Something tight and dangerous entered Malia’s expression as it swiveled towards Derek. “You have no right to withhold him from Asgardian justice.”  


Derek wasn't any more intimidated than he was before his forest battle with Malia earlier. He tipped his chin down, jaw gritted. “And you have no right to withhold from us the chance to protect our world.”  


The tension became so abruptly palpable that Scott was worried that they would come to blows _again_ , in the middle of the quinjet. Malia shifted forward in her seat.  


They held that livewire for too many breaths before she leaned back again. “If I help you retrieve the Tesseract and thwart whatever conniving plan Loki undoubtedly already has in motion, will you give him up to me afterward without fight?”  


Scott interjected then, trying to keep his voice warm and calm. “We can't make that promise, but we can advise the man in charge as best we can. I think that’s probably doable.”  


“Then I shall make an accord with your King.” Malia decided with a sharp nod to her head. “I will aid you in your struggle, and when Midgard is safe, I will take Loki away to face the wrath of Odin.”  


It was as good an agreement as they were ever going to come to. Scott nodded in satisfaction and leaned back into the padding of his seat.

  
He spent the rest of the flight trying to pretend he couldn’t hear what sounded like Loki’s faint _laughter_ , right at the edge of audible.


	23. Chapter 23

They were met by the largest single group of S.H.I.E.L.D. agents Scott had seen at one time, when they finally landed on the helicarrier. _Agents_ even felt like the wrong word, too kind or subtle a word for the personnel arrayed in heavy assault armor, with enormous automatic weapons and grim expressions. They took over the escort of Loki immediately and whisked him away down into the bowels of the helicarrier with brisk, sharp strides.  


Agent Reyes met the rest of them, a far less formal and intimidating escort, but no less an escort. She led them on a different path to the the briefing room at the back of the bridge, only to leave them there, as if she weren’t concerned about Malia’s addition to the group _or_ that the air as it hung between them all was thick with discomfort.  


On a screen at the center of the table, a live feed from the security camera in the detention cell they’d put Loki in was playing. Deaton had gone in for a one on one conversation, separated from Loki by a sheet of glass and all of the complicated technological failsafes that surrounded a cell ultimately meant to hold something called _The Hulk_ instead. The conversation itself was almost frustratingly circuitous, both men smiling too much and not meaning an inch of their smiles. Somehow, nothing of what was said left Scott with any _less_ of a feeling that Loki was still in complete control.  


Neither did the fact that Loki turned, as Deaton left the area, to smile _directly into the camera_ before the feed cut.  


Scott tried to swallow his feeling of disquiet as he turned back to the others in the room. Liam was looking at the now-blank screen with a mild expression which perfectly showed his weariness with the situation. “Well, he’s charming.”  


Malia made a low sound in her chest, frowning in Liam’s direction. “He is not the most favored in the family.”  


“He thinks he’s still in control.” Scott couldn't let the uneasy feeling crawling in his gut go without comment. “He has something planned. What’s his angle?”  


“He has an army of beings that call themselves the Chitauri. We have never seen anything like them. We don't know who they are or where they came from, only that they are many.” Malia’s voice was firm and grave as she spoke. “I know not what he promised them, but I suspect he wishes to trade the power of the Tesseract for their conquering of your world.”  


Derek gave a low snort from across the room. “Well, obviously we’re not going to let them do that. How is he planning to get his army here anyway?”  


Scott could see the realization slowly dawn on Liam’s face. “That’s why he took Selvig. He’s going to try to open a portal.”  


“Who’s Selvig?” Scott prompted, feeling as if he had missed something important.  


It was Allison, rather than Liam, who answered the question. “Dr. Erik Selvig. He is one of the most respected astrophysicists on the planet. Loki seems to have him under whatever mind control spell he has Hawkeye under.”  


“So he has at least two mind controlled, highly capable people still out there working as his agents, one of which has intimate knowledge of how S.H.I.E.L.D. works.” Scott could feel the dread squirming in his gut. “So the question is, why did he even let us take him when he must have been able to plan an escape at basically any time?”  


The realization that Liam had so recently displayed was replaced with a frown. “No, you aren’t focusing on the right part of this equation. Loki doesn’t need to be free for his plan to keep moving, it doesn’t matter if he’s in custody as long as he has people out there. What _they’re_ doing is the important part. What did they need all the Iridium that they stole in Germany for?”  


Scott still wasn’t certain he knew exactly had Iridium _was_ , but the way that Derek snapped his fingers abruptly made it clear that _Derek_ knew, at least. “It’s a stabilizing agent. When Loki first used his portal at S.H.I.E.L.D. headquarters and too the Tesseract--”  


“And _Lahey_.” Allison interrupted.  


“--yes, _and_ Lahey. The point is, the portal collapsed behind him almost immediately. That’s no way to bring an army over. But with enough Iridium, he could stabilize the portal; make it as big as he wanted and hold it open for as long as he wanted.”  


The conversation was starting to move to a level and pace that felt distinctly over Scott’s head. Liam frowned again, leaning forward against the table to look over it towards Derek. “He’d need a power source, though. Nevermind all of the other materials you’d need to build a framework--those would be easy to find. But something capable of giving the cube the kick-start it’d need to channel that much energy, and not let the whole thing go supernova? The cube itself would heat up to incredible temperatures in the process.”  


Derek stood, but apparently only to move as his mind did, running over the information and processing it at an incredible pace. “If Selvig solved the quantum tunnelling problem, he could use any reactor he wanted. That doesn’t narrow the field enough.”  


Silence stretched over the briefing room for a few moments, unevenly distributed between Dunbar and Hale clearly cutting their teeth against a scientific logic-problem that the rest of them didn’t understand. Scott looked at each face in turn, checked in on every heartbeat to find them all evenly paced, scents almost resigned to a stalled out forward momentum.  


Scott shifted uncomfortably in his seat, letting his own mind mull over the details he had available to him. Finally, he hazarded a sentence, painfully aware of how much he felt like an elementary school kid listening to college students talk. “What about that scepter of his? It fired off exactly the same energy as the Argent weapons. Those are familiar. _Formidable_.”  


“And powered by the Tesseract itself,” Director Deaton added as he stepped into the room, expression solemn, “Which, I think, says more about the Argents than it says about Loki. The thing is, we have plenty of data from your war, Cap. We know how the weapon works. What _I_ want to know is how he used it to corrupt both Lahey _and_ Selvig _._ ”  


“Well, that sounds like _not-science_ , which is _not my field_.” Derek announced, moving himself towards the door that led back into the helicarrier’s main decks. He paused just before he passed through it, lifting his eyes towards Liam.  


With a strange, full-body startle, Liam started to follow him. “Let’s go do the _actual_ science.”  


They disappeared through the door already passing words between them that Scott felt he had no hope of ever understanding.  


After that, people began to trickle out of the briefing room. Deaton led Malia out, indicating he would show her the accommodations for her while she was staying with S.H.I.E.L.D. Their voices faded out to the sound of the director’s quiet but very pointed questions about Thor’s hammer.  


Once they were alone, Allison slid around the conference table to sit next to Scott, her dark eyes thoughtful. “Something’s still bothering you.”  


Scott swallowed, closing his eyes against a sudden rush of weariness. “Yeah. I may not know anything about quantum tunnelling but I’ve seen men with hearts like Loki’s before. They think all of this is just...playing chess. Moving people around like pieces on a game board. They don't lose gracefully. If Loki were losing, he’d be _losing it_ , he’d be angry and lashing out. He isn’t. He’s still calm and collected. He’s still _winning_. And we don’t even know what the _game_ is.”  


“You think he’s still playing the game from inside that cell.” Allison concluded easily, her features carefully neutral as she considered Scott’s face.  


“No. I _know_ he’s still playing the game. I just can’t see where he’s moving the pieces.”  


She nodded, bringing her bottom lip into her mouth for the space of an instant. “Okay. I believe you. I’ll figure it out. But in the meantime… when was the last time you slept?”  


The question seemed to come out of nowhere, such a blindside that Scott couldn’t mask the startled little laugh that it brought out of him. “What? You don’t think I slept _enough_ , after, what was it, seventy years?”  


“Metaphorically, _philosophically_ , yes, you’re probably right.” Allison smiled, standing from her chair so that she could pat at Scott’s shoulder as she started to leave the room. “Literally, _physically_? Even _Captain America_ needs to rest. You should grab a few hours while the eggheads do their science. You never know when you’ll get another chance.”

  
A soft smile, as tired as Allison had suggested he might be, crept over Scott’s face. He gave her a grateful nod as she started to leave. “...thanks. Maybe I will.”


	24. Chapter 24

 

Scott fell into sleep embarrassingly quickly after his head hit the pillow, like falling through the rabbit hole into another world.  


Some time in the past, further away than it felt like it was, he and Stiles had visited an orchard outside of New York City. It hadn’t been too long before they’d signed up, in the middle of apple season, and the orchard had needed the help with the harvest due to the war. The trees had been heavy-branched with fat, ripe apples, splashes of green and red in the riot of oranges and golds the rest of the trees had become with the onset of autumn. With his slight frame and his asthma, Scott had been almost useless, but he’d dutifully held the ladder steady and bantered with Stiles as Stiles did the work of tossing the apples down. Most of the apples, Scott had even caught to set carefully, dutifully into the bushels to prevent bruising. Stiles had only hit him in the head with an apple four or five times the whole day.  


In the dream, Scott was neither small nor asthmatic. In the dream, there was no ladder. Scott simply held Stiles up on his shoulders, comfortable with his best friend’s knees wrapped over his shoulders, calves hooked under Scott’s arms. He kept his hands on Stiles’ shins and the apples and Stiles’ dusky voice rained down like manna.  


Scott mostly just let Stiles talk, about everything and anything that was on his mind. He’d missed the sound of him rambling on like he’d have missed a limb. Some part of him knew it was just a dream, but that same part was desperate to stay in it for as long as possible, to stretch this moment out into infinity just so Scott could stay where Stiles still existed.  


At lunchtime the orchard provided a jug of fresh cider to be split between them, a loaf of crusty day-old bread, a couple of apples and a modest amount of cheese and some unidentifiable meatloaf. Scott and Stiles took their repast up into the loft of the barn, where it was moderately warmer, and looked out over the neat lines of trees as they ate.  


There was a companionable silence while they sliced up the individual components of their meal with Stiles’ pocket knife and turned them into little sandwiches, cold meat and cheese and juicy fresh apple slices blending together with every bite. Stiles made it maybe a third of the way through his sandwich before he started to speak, voice quiet in the way it had always been when he was admitting something he didn’t think Scott wanted to hear. “I’ve been talking to the recruiter again. I think I’m going to sign up soon.”  


Something clenched in Scott’s chest, reaching up to grasp at his throat. He suddenly wasn’t very interested in the food in his hand. “... _Stiles_.”  


Those whiskey-deep eyes turned to Scott, then, sharp as they’d ever been. Stiles leaned in just a little bit, gaze never faltering from Scott’s face. “You should come with me. They’ll deploy us in the same regiment, they’ve gotta. We could be out there, together, making a _difference_.”  


“Stiles, it’s _dangerous_!” Scott protested, stupidly, like he couldn’t find any other words to explain the dread creeping along his limbs, or the horrors of the war that felt like it was so very far away from this little farm in New York.  


“Yeah, and it’s _killing_ me to think we’re not over there helping _end_ it so it’ll _stop_ being dangerous!”  


Scott made a sound of dismay, fingers clenching until he’d put them through his sandwich entirely. There weren’t any claws, but he held his fingers hooked and stiff like they were there anyway, and like the mystery meat was the enemy. “What if it _does_? Stiles, _think_ about it, even if they took me, even if we got in the same unit and went together, there’s a real chance you’d _die_.”  


The snort Stiles offered in response was ugly and violent, itself. “Lots of people are dying out there that don’t deserve it, I don’t see why it makes a difference--”  


“It makes a difference to ME!” Scott couldn’t keep himself from shouting, trying to impress into those few words his utter fear, his _knowledge_ of what happened if Stiles was allowed to join the army. His voice started to quaver as he forced himself to continue, “Don’t you get it? If you go, you’ll _die_. And if you die, I’ll--I’ll die, too. Or, at least all the parts of me that _matter_. I can’t do this without you, I _can’t_ , and I don’t understand why you were so eager to run off and leave this all behind, I don’t understand why you...why you had to…”  


The sobbing took over, then. Scott let his ruined lunch slip from his hands. Stiles leaned in, moving the food and the half-drunk jug of cider to the side, just so that he could wrap both arms around Scott, one around his shoulders and the other curved up so that the palm of Stiles’ big hand cupped the back of Scott’s skull. He tugged Scott in, letting him bury his face in Stiles’ shirt. It smelled of dirt and sweat and _Stiles_ and it all seemed so, so _real_ as Scott soaked it with his tears.  


“You know why I had to.” Stiles said, after a few minutes, his lower hand moving to rub up and down Scott’s spine.  


“I know,” Scott agreed, muffled by Stiles’ chest, still struggling to pull his tears back in. “I know. But you _left me_. You left me and it wasn’t _worth_ it.”  


“I didn’t want to. You know that, too.”  


“I know. But that doesn’t make this _hole_ in me any smaller.”  


Stiles chuckled, which seemed so inappropriate except for how dark and humorless the sound came out of his chest. “It will one day. One day that hole won’t even be there at all. You’ll figure it out, Scotty.”  


The nickname threatened to bring on a new wave of tears. Scott scrunched his whole face up against them, fingers clutching at Stiles’ shirt. “I kind of don’t want to.”  


They sat like that for a long time. Eventually, Scott found the strength to stop crying, to straighten up a little and stop clutching so desperately at Stiles. Backing up a little, he could see the stains of his own tears on Stiles’ shirt. Looking up at Stiles’ face, he could see stains of tears there, too. His breath came into him on the crest of a noisy hiccup.  


Stiles moved the hand that had been on the back of Scott’s head to the side of his face. Those long fingers, dirty from half a day’s work of picking apples, curved along Scott’s jawline like they’d been made to measure that space. The touch was so tender, so careful, it almost made Scott start crying again.  


Stiles smiled, sadly. “I know you can be strong, Scotty. I know you can. You always were so strong. There’s a lot of work to do, but you can do it. If you can’t believe in yourself, just remember, _I_ always believed in you. But you gotta get going, now.”  


Denial rose up like a wave of nausea. Scott shook his head, trying to press his cheek into Stiles’ palm. “No, I don’t want to. I don’t want to go, I want to stay here, with you.”  


A thumb traced its way over Scott’s cheekbone, flicking away another tear. “You _gotta_. You can’t quit now. The whole world is going to need saving again, _really_ soon, and you gotta help. You _gotta_ help, or they aren’t gonna make it. You can do this.”  


And then, just like that, Scott was awake again, gasping out the name like it was with his dying breath, “--Stiles…”

  
  



	25. Chapter 25

By the time Scott had redressed and shoved himself out of his quarters, there was an unrest that bordered on anger boiling along his veins. His cheek still burned from where Stiles had touched him in the dream, desperate for the touch to return. It was made worse, like a bone-deep itch, by the knowledge that Stiles had never touched him like that while Stiles was alive.  


He just fell back on the terrible reminder that Stiles was _dead_ , dead for seventy years, and there was no way for Scott to claw or roar his way back in time to earn that touch for real.  


His shoulders hunched up, tight around his spine, and began to pace the halls on the helicarrier, like a wolf on the prowl.  


Scott found himself drawn back to the lab, where Liam and Derek were still working on whatever _science!_ they had been pouring over in an attempt to narrow down Loki’s intended power source. They were both at the opposite side of the lab from the door, seemingly caught up in their examinations of Loki’s scepter, which had been placed on a stand there. Liam seemed to be examining it with some kind of electronic device.  


Almost precisely at the point that Scott walked in, Derek leaned in and jabbed Liam in the side with something sharp and glinting like metal.  


Liam jolted with the contact and lifted one hand to rub at his side, giving a furrow-browed, passingly cross look up at Derek.  


What bubbled up in Scott’s chest was more than passingly cross. It felt more like actual anger, fueled by the lingering emotions from his dream. He strode into the room on the crest of it, voice ringing like a bell. “What are you _doing_?!”  


Liam looked up with an expression that bordered on embarrassment, but Hale had no such shame. He seemed completely unfazed as he glanced up, discarding the object in his hand to one of the lab surfaces. “Apparently, nothing.”  


“And what, exactly, was your plan if something _had_ happened?” Scott couldn't _believe_ this guy, risking letting _The Hulk_ loose in the middle of all of this sensitive equipment and these innocent people, all for, _what_ , idle curiosity? Something near a growl rolled at the bottom of his throat.  


This time, the expression and gesture Liam gave was dismissive at best. “It's okay, I wouldn't even be here if I couldn't handle unexpected turbulence.”  


Part of Scott appreciated the reassurance, but mostly he couldn’t believe that Liam seemed so ready to just absolve Hale of any responsibility for whatever it was he was trying to do. He turned on Derek with a frown to fill his whole face. “Do you think you could maybe focus on the task at hand instead of playing chicken with an unstoppable force of nature?”  


“I _am_ focused. It's just that Kira can only work so fast.” Derek seemed completely unconcerned by Scott’s frustration, circling back around to pick a container of blueberries off of a counter.  


“Who the hell is _Kira_?”  


Derek’s heavy eyebrows popped upwards at the question, as if it weren’t a completely justifiable question. He put a few blueberries into his mouth, tucking them into one of his cheeks. “Kira is my co-pilot, personal assistant, research intern--everything, basically. I first programmed her to help me with business meetings and scheduling, but she’s become far more useful than that.”  


Scott _glowered_ , feeling his chin tip downwards as he met Derek’s gaze. He’d been doing some reading of his own, and he was pretty sure he knew what Derek meant. “So Kira is an Artificial Intelligence?”  


The noise Derek made in response was incredulous and indescribable. He leaned in, tapping at one of the monitors. “She’s so much more than just an artificial intelligence. Even so, she can only work _small_ miracles. Give her some time and she’ll have all of those little shielded secrets unraveled.”  


The glowering turned straight on its head and turned into a flavor of shock that felt almost _nauseous_. “You’re--you’re _hacking_ S.H.I.E.L.D.?!”  


Derek tossed a few more blueberries into his mouth, glancing back at Scott with an expression that clearly couldn’t figure out why Scott was upset. “Why _shouldn’t_ I hack S.H.I.E.L.D. Are you saying you think they’re completely trustworthy and not at all shady?”

“I’m saying they’re our _allies_ and you aren’t supposed to _hack_ your _allies_!” Scott protested, trying not to let his voice grow too loud. He was still angry, and this wasn’t helping in the least.  


“Well, maybe you can get where _you_ want to go by just _following orders_ , but historically speaking that doesn’t work out for the little guy. Or the big guy, or any guy but the guy who gave the orders.” Derek’s voice had picked up a low hum of a growl, likely inaudible to human ears. Liam didn’t flinch.  


Scott didn’t flinch either, precisely, but he couldn’t keep himself from matching that same subsonic snarl. “So your solution is to completely betray the trust that Deaton’s put in us and go digging around in his secret files?”  


_There_ , Liam’s voice drifted into the conversation, far calmer than either Derek or Scott had been. “I’m not condoning _hacking S.H.I.E.L.D._ , exactly, but I am going to point out that Deaton had a cell specifically built to jettison me to the bottom of the ocean if I became too much of a liability.”  


Derek’s attention had already turned back to the screens and monitors on the counter in front of him. He didn’t even give the common decency of eye contact as he spoke to Scott, as one spoke to a child who wasn’t grasping a basic concept, “Deaton is a man obsessed with knowing all the angles, but he’s still only told _us_ the exact angles we need to keep us on _his_ trajectory. Loki, as a global threat, is new. And yet here we all are, basically all neatly rounded up within twenty-four hours, on a massive helicarrier with resources tailored to all of us. He had your shield and uniform redesigned. You have your own _quarters_. You don’t have even one question about _why_ he already had those?”  


As much as Scott _desperately_ didn’t want to admit that Derek might have had a point, and _absolutely_ didn’t want to absolve Derek of breaching the security of the division they were meant to be working for, something still twisted in his chest at the words. There was _something_ there, some tiny element, that almost felt true.  


He didn’t want it to be true.  


His own words came out sounding far more sullen and childish than Scott wanted them to. “I still think that Loki’s the real problem here. We should be _focused_.”  


This time, Derek actually lifted a hand, flicking it with sharp-wristed motions at Scott. “Okay, and you are disrupting the _focus_ , here. Go do something else, let us think. We’ll let you know when it’s time to bonk somebody in the head with a dinner plate.”  


Scott’s hands found themselves in fists before he had even realized the insult had landed. Another low growl rolled out of his chest, which garnered absolutely no reaction from Hale, but brought a sharp, almost wide-eyed upward snap of Liam’s head. The tension in the room abruptly doubled.

  
Feeling even less settled than he had when he entered the lab, Scott turned on his heel and left before something terrible could happen.


	26. Chapter 26

Scott had never been afraid of fights, not even before the serum. He’d gotten into them a lot--too much, even--and frequently needed Stiles to come pull his hide out of the fire before it became crispy enough to make pork rinds out of. Despite this, he’d only ever really gotten into fights in an attempt to protect someone, usually a stranger, frequently a child, almost universally someone he’d thought was even more powerless against their oppressors as he had been. He’d gone through the entire process of getting the serum and deploying into Germany just to fight to protect people who weren’t as powerful as he was.  


He’d never been _spoiling_ for a fight before this moment, right now.  


It had always been an emotion he’d let Stiles carry for him, this limb-itching _need_ to destroy something with his own knuckles and claws. He’d never borne its burden himself, before, and part of him wanted to find it startling, unnerving.  


That part of him was easily overpowered by the part of him that the serum had awoken, that had some kind of intrinsic need to tear things apart from time to time.  


He’d gone back to prowling the halls, hands flexing and unflexing at his sides. He must have been putting off some kind of _energy_ , because the halls cleared in front of him, quickly emptying of any S.H.I.E.L.D. operatives of any sort that could have been caught unhappily on the prow of a True Alpha’s fury. It was better in many ways, but it also left Scott unfulfilled with this growing storm of anger in him. If he’d still been in Brooklyn, he’d have gone down to the gym and torn through a dozen punching bags.  


He wasn’t in Brooklyn. He didn’t know where the nearest punching bag even _was_.  


Scott made his way through the corridors of the massive helicarrier without paying much attention to where he was going. It was seemingly instinct that eventually led him to the massive steel door near the aft of the ship marked with an inconspicuous _Secure Storage 10-C._  


Something, maybe that same instinct, urged Scott to go through the door.  


He closed his eyes and tried to push his anger to the side long enough to listen around him. He stretched out his senses, attuning himself to every tiny sound and scent that surrounded him, all the hums and clicks and ticks of a flying aircraft carrier in operation, the stench of oil and grease and hot metal. There was no one near to him, or at least no one near enough to matter.  


He didn’t let himself overthink the moment. Scott lifted both hands and pressed them against the door, turning the hatch release until the whole thing slid to the side and there was enough room for Scott to slip into the room. He turned immediately to ease the door closed again, checking after he’d done so to make sure nobody seemed to be coming after him.  


There was nothing. Scott turned and took in the room behind him, piece by piece.  


It was, at the very least, what it had been labeled--a storage room with a high ceiling, rows and rows of neatly packed boxes and a catwalk just above it all. Navigating the room from within the rows of boxes would be helplessly inefficient, so Scott bunched his legs up beneath him and then flung himself at the catwalk. He overshot it, just a little, and ended up coming down harder than he intended on it, both feet stumbling. He paused _again_ , but despite the clumsy amount of noise he was making, no one had noticed.  


He paced along the catwalk, eyes drifting over the boxed without being sure what it was he was looking for. All he knew was that he was restless and somehow he’d been drawn here, compulsed in some way to break into the storage room and search it for something. Scott could only hope he’d know it when he saw it.  


He did. He knew it so well his blood ran cold.  


There, in the pile furthest back in the corner, like someone had wanted it to be forgotten and yet still easily accessible, was an open crate. Given the dust of surrounding everything, the streaks of handprints that his red-burning eyes could see through it all, this crate had been disturbed recently and carelessly left unsecured. Beneath it were another half dozen or more crates just like it, at _least_ , let alone how many others might have existed behind it, or in other storage rooms that Scott hadn’t discovered.  


Maybe _hundreds_ of crates full of clean, funtional-looking Argent weaponry.  


At first, Scott was frozen on the catwalk. It wasn’t even shock that took him, as he stared down at that huge gun, the kind that he knew spat out enormous gobs of blue energy--  


\-- _striking his shield and throwing Stiles back with it, tearing a hole in the train, Stiles clinging to the crumbling wreckage with his eyes full of fear, Stiles reaching, reaching,_ _ **reaching**_ _, always reaching, forever out of grasp, now, tumbling into the white until it swallowed him whole--_  


\--but more like rage as a tangible thing, uncaged from his chest in the form of a terrible, furious roar.  


The room rattled around him, all the bolts and fastenings on the catwalk threatening to give way.  


Scott lept down from it to grab the first Argent weapon he could lay a hand on, and crashed his way through the storage room like an angry bull. He did not carefully slide through the door unseen. He kicked it down.  


If he’d been thinking, maybe he would have been more unsettled by how easy and instinctive it was to sort through the scents and the heartbeats on the helicarrier until he found the ones he knew matched Director Deaton. Maybe Scott would have been taken aback to realize he could even _recognize_ them so readily. He wasn’t taken aback at all. He was just _angry_ , and he needed explanations.  


As he tracked Deaton, the more it became clear that he was in the lab that Scott had previously left Derek and Liam. There seemed to be a lot of people in the lab already, in fact--Deaton, Derek, Liam, Malia and Allison were all there, everyone’s heartrate elevated, everyone smelling stressed, anxious, even angry.  


Good. Scott was angry, too. He’d fit right in.

 

He could hear voices as he started to make his way through the door, Derek’s terse, low tone asking _so what’s phase two, then?_  


All eyes turned to Scott as he strode in, slamming the gun he’d been carrying down on the nearest surface. “ _Apparently_ , using the cube to make a bunch of Argent weapons instead of _destroying it_.”  


There were three seconds of silence before Deaton’s frown grew loud enough to form into words. “You can’t possibly think that we’re going to build those just because we have a few of them in cold storage--”  


“ _A few?!_ In _cold storage_?!” Scott snarled, his hands fisting up again. He could feel the tips of his claws pricking at his palms, trying to extend. “I saw _crates_ of these things. And I _saw_ them because they’d been left out in the open, _opened_ , in fact, which is the exact _opposite_ of _cold storage_.”  


Deaton opened his mouth to protest again, but Derek interrupted him with one sweep of a hand, a gesture that brought up schematic after schematic for the Tesseract-powered weaponry up on the room monitors. “So all of these plans are purely academic? Even all of these little tweaks and improvements you have written in the margins?”  


For the first time since they’d met, Scott was sure he was detecting an edge of anger in Liam’s voice when he spoke. “Is this _really_ why you have Hale and me tracking this thing down? So you can use it to _stockpile_?”  


“Dr. Dunbar, maybe this would be a good time to take a break?” Allison’s own voice was all sweet honey, imperfectly coating the steel edge she carried beneath it. She obviously wanted Liam out of the room sooner rather than later.  


Liam wasn’t budging. He scowled at her, head shaking. “No, no, I don’t think so, I think it’s _really_ important that I hear the explanation for this.”  


Scott couldn’t contain himself any longer. He turned on Deaton, trying his best just to keep his fangs back. “How could you do this? _How_ could you think this was justified? I’ve _seen_ what these weapons can do, _first-hand_. I’ve seen men _disintegrate_ in front of me because of this power. This isn’t something _anybody_ should be using!”  


“We didn’t have much of a choice.” Deaton said, his eyes turning on Malia.  


Scott let his tone drop, as if there were any way to express himself with any more gravity. “There’s _always_ a choice.”  


Malia folded her arms across her chest, expression pinching towards the middle of her face. “I don’t know why you’re looking at me like I had anything to do with this.”  


“Because you had everything to do with it.” The answer came in the same cool, disaffected tone that Deaton delivered almost everything with. “Because a year ago you and your _Uncle_ had a little spat and leveled an entire city. Are we supposed to just let you _do_ that? To trample whatever you want?”  


Malia’s frown intensified. “The fact that we were here, or that we destroyed that town, was little more than an accident. It was not our intention to attack your planet. That we were here at all was sheer happenstance.”  


Deaton shook his head again, not once looking away from Malia’s expression. “Well, your _sheer happenstance_ cost lives and the _livelihoods_ of most of the people in that town. The fallout from Dunbar’s experiments once leveled half of Harlem. Times are _changing,_ the nature of the threats we face are _changing_ , we need our weaponry to keep up.”  


“--are you saying you think I’m a _threat_? After you _dragged_ me here?” Liam took a step forward, his hands tightening on the counter. “I was minding my own business! I was _doing good_. I was _helping people_. I didn’t need to be here, and I _definitely_ don’t need to be helping you track down the thing you’re going to use to make weapons _specifically to use on me!”_  


“Liam--” Allison started, but Derek spoke over her to point out, “S.H.I.E.L.D. being exactly as not-trustworthy as I said doesn’t change the fact that if we don’t find that Tesseract Loki’s going to use it to bring a whole bunch of people _we don’t want_ here--”  


“--at which point I suppose you will simply shoot them with your person-dissolving guns--” Malia interjected.  


At that point, everyone started to shout at once, and Scott stopped being able to keep track of it, even when it was his own voice adding to the chaos. Everything in his head felt too-tight, filled with some kind of buzzing like his mind had been replaced by a lot of angry bees in a jar. He staggered to the side, rubbing at his temple, watching as the room started to fisheye and move in slow motion.  


It took too many breaths for Scott to realize that in all of the confusion, Liam had reached down to pick up Loki’s scepter. The blue crystal at the tip of it was glowing fiercely.  


Still working on instinct, Scott summoned up the deepest, loudest part of himself. He _roared_ and wrapped it around the sound of a name, grateful to discover that the bone-rattling sound of it chased away the buzzing, the pressure, the feeling of something reaching in from the outside to puppet his limbs. “ _LIAM!!_ ”  


Dunbar looked down at his hand, and the scepter in it, like he was shocked to see them both. After a little, helpless noise, he put it down entirely. “I--”  


Whatever he might have said was interrupted by a loud, obnoxious beep on one of the consoles. Derek turned to it immediately, and just as immediately furrowed his brow. “We got a hit on the Tesseract, but it can’t be right, because it says--”  


An explosion tore through the room, then, and the world became nothing but chaos and noise.

  
  



	27. Chapter 27

The whole room shook and rolled, tossing its occupants around like pebbles in an avalanche. The air was filled with the odds and ends that populated a working science lab, glass shattering as it skidded off of counters onto the floor and metal shrieking as it was stressed past its shearing point. With a great shudder, a huge section of the floor tore away, falling down into the floor below them. It took Liam and Allison with it, their voices lost in the turmoil.  


Scott ended up dazed and braced against the far wall, one hand having reached almost on instinct to steady Derek. They passed a single, panicked look between them before Scott squeezed at his shoulder and tried to turn the gesture into a shove. “Time to suit up!”  


Derek’s response was a grunt of assent and to lurch himself up the uneven incline the room was now tilted at, towards the door.  


Scott was, himself, already mostly in his uniform. Running at top speeds, it didn’t take him long at all to fetch his shield, snap into place the communication device that let him in on the tangled chaos of the radio waves. A fuzz and a crackle and then Scott could hear Agent Romero speaking in a stressed, clipped tone, explaining that one of the main turbines keeping the helicarrier in the air had been damaged, and that repairs were desperately needed to keep them aloft, but also impossible _while_ aloft.  


Derek’s voice came through a second later, just as grim. “I’m on it. McCall, I’m going to need an extra pair of hands.”  


Scott wasn’t entirely sure what he was supposed to do to supply _extra hands_ to a job that Romero had just indicated required _flying_ , but he acknowledged Derek’s request and started running for the damaged engine anyway.  


Agent Romero’s voice reported that the helicarrier was under assault by forces in S.H.I.E.L.D. uniforms.  


There wasn't enough time to consider what that might mean, because Scott was exploding through a bulkhead with his claws out to end up on the scene of the damaged engine.  


A huge chunk of the helicarrier was just _missing,_ torn metal flapping in the frantic wind, and for too many seconds Scott couldn't breathe at all as he looked at the wreckage. All he could see, in an overlay spread out on top of reality, was the snow-ridden mountains of the alps and the view from a speeding train car. It wasn't until Iron Wolf swung into view on the opposite side of the turbine and his voice spoke over the radio that Scott could even move his limbs again.  


“I think I can get this turbine working again if I do some patch repairs and get the coolant system back online. That part is the part I need you in.” Hovering over the broken engine, Iron Wolf was pointing to a panel on one of the remaining walls of the helicarrier. “Right there.”  


Naturally, there was no pathway remaining from where Scott was to where he needed to be.  


He considered asking Derek for a lift, but he had already vanished inside the turbine casing to do repairs. Scott was on his own.  


The only real solution he had was to jump it. He could just see himself missing entirely and hurtling into the empty air below the helicarrier. Scott wasn’t sure _what_ city they were over--he thought it was maybe New York. He wondered, if he missed, if Derek would catch him in time, or if he’d just become so much more detritus falling from the sky. If it wasn’t for the entire helicarrier full of people relying on his engine coming back online, Scott might have even thought that was a _better solution_.  


A voice bubbled up out of his memory, as if carried to him on the howling wind. _Just remember, I always believed in you._  


Scott took a deep breath. He gathered his strength, used his shield as a counterweight, and _flung_ himself across the divide.  


His boots skidded as he made contact on the other side. Scott lashed out with his free hand and dug his claws into the metal, stabilizing himself. When he felt his footing was sure, Scott maneuvered himself to claw the cover of the panel off. Inside was a mess of wires and levers, none of which made any sense to Scott. “Well...I’m here.”  


“Good, that’s good, that’s progress.” Derek’s voice sounded strained and overworked. Even over the sound of all hell breaking loose around them, Scott could hear Iron Wolf moving through the turbine, patching metal, realigning machinery, doing a lot of other things that were more or less beyond Scott’s comprehension. Even while he was doing it, Derek continued speaking. “How many of those levers are in the overload position?”  


“I don’t even know what that means!” Scott declared, eyes skimming over all of the different switches without comprehending what _any_ of their positions were.  


“How many of them are in the middle instead of flicked up or flicked down?” Derek sounded like he thought he was speaking to a child.  


Still, the question was simple enough, and so was the answer. “About half of them. The other ones are up.”  


Even Derek’s exasperated exhale carried over the radio. “Leave the ones that are up like they are. The ones that are in the middle, push them down. Then on my signal, push them all up, and throw that red lever to the side. That should restore power to the turbine and then slow the blades down long enough for me to get free of it.”  


“... _should_? What happens if that _isn’t_ what it does?”  


“Then I guess it purees me and I get to be the second thing today to rip the engine into shreds.” Something about Derek’s matter-of-fact delivery somehow made the whole thing worse.  


Over the comms, somebody frantically announced that _Thor_ and _The Hulk_ were fighting each other through multiple levels of the hangar bays.  


Behind Scott, the turbine began to make shuddering, groaning noises as Iron Wolf started to push the blades around. He could hear the whine of the suit’s boosters as Derek pulled on extra power to get everything moving. “Ready on those switches, Cap.”  


Naturally, Scott had just finished throwing all of the levers into the _on_ position and was just reaching for the last lever when men in S.H.I.E.L.D. uniforms burst from the door that Scott had entered from. They turned towards him and immediately opened fire.  


Iron Wolf called over the radio again. “McCall, you need to throw that last lever!”  


Scott barely got his shield up in time, hunkering down behind it as bullets rained down on him from across that short jump. Urgency sparked along his limbs as he heard the turbine start to pick up speed, but every time Scott reached up to grab at the level, more gunfire rattled around him. He got at least one bullet straight through his hand for his troubles and had to pull it back down to heal the damage before he could try again. At least they didn’t seem to be wolfsbane bullets.  


“Scott!” Derek shouted over the comm, sounding desperate. The turbine was still picking up speed.  


The men across the gap were efficient, firing in small groups so that there was never any gap in the assault. Scott kept lurching towards the lever and being rebuffed by their constant firing, another bullet lodging in his shoulder and a third in his thigh when he revealed it from behind his shield. Behind them, the turbine kept whining faster, and faster, approaching its normal operational velocity.  


Over the comms, Derek’s voice rose in a strangled, frightened growl of a yell. The sound of the turbine was suddenly undercut with a horrific shrieking sound, metal tearing through metal.  


Scott had no more time to hide behind his shield.  


Instead, he straightened, and took the bullets to his chest and stomach without thought or complaint. He brought his left arm up and _flung_ his shield towards the men on the outcropping by the door. It slammed into three of them and ricocheted off into the empty sky, dragging _two_ of those same men with it. The last one stopped firing long enough for Scott to fling _himself_ towards the lever and put his body’s weight behind throwing it.  


The turbine slowed, and the horrible noise of metal mauling metal stopped.  


Scott collapsed onto his hands and knees, eyes scrunching shut as he felt his body starting to push the bullets back out again. He was pretty sure one of them had clipped a lung, because breathing was next to impossible. He kept sucking air in with desperate gasps, never feeling like he had enough. It was a familiar feeling, if not one he hadn’t at all missed.  


Not at all unlike the feeling of looking up to see the final false S.H.I.E.L.D. agent back on his feet, a gun leveled at Scott’s head.  


They stared at each other for a few protracted heartbeats. The enemy readjusted his grip on his gun.  


_Then_ , the enemy was blown backwards off of his perch by a blast of repulsor fire.  


Scott’s lung finally unfurled into its proper operation, and he turned to see Derek hovering in the space just to the side of where he knelt. The Iron Wolf armor was scuffed and dented, one of its decorative ears torn, but it seemed to be fully functional, the blue glow of its eyes undimmed.  


In the hand not held up in repulsor-firing position, Derek held Scott’s shield. Its paint was equally scuffed, but like Iron Wolf himself, it seemed serviceable. Derek seemed to notice Scott looking at it and hefted it in Scott’s direction without actually throwing it. “You dropped something.”  


Despite everything, Scott found himself wheezing through a smile. “Thanks.”  


He was in no real shape to make the jump back to the door, not without waiting for his body to eject the last of the bullets, but Derek seemed to understand that, too. He hovered in close, wrapping his free arm around Scott’s waist and ducking until Scott’s arm was stretched over the metal shoulders of his armor. Scott got as solid a grip as he could manage without putting holes in Derek’s suit with his claws, clinging in place until Derek set him down near the door again.  


They waited until they were both solidly inside the helicarrier’s undamaged portion to pass the shield off. Scott grinned at Derek, wearily, as Iron Wolf popped his faceplate open, clearly about to treat Scott to another of his dry witticisms.

 

The one-liner never came. All it meant was that Scott could see the collapsing star of Derek’s expression as Deaton’s voice reported, grimly, over the comm units, “Agent Reyes is down.”


	28. Chapter 28

With the engine fixed, it didn’t take long for the legitimate agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. to retake the helicarrier. Scott and Derek made their way to the briefing room, barely speaking to each other or the other agents they found along the way. Scott’s entire body _ached_ , pinpointed in the places where he’d taken bullets and they’d been slowly forced back out. Half of him wanted to sleep, maybe forever, but the other half of him worried that if he did, he’d only be taunted by the things he could never have.

 

He just had to keep moving forward, no matter how much it hurt.  


By the time they got back to the briefing room, Scott had learned that both Thor and the Hulk had fallen out of the helicarrier completely, Loki had escaped, and that Allison had broken Lahey out of Loki’s mind control and was currently overseeing his unconscious body as he, apparently, slept off the impact of the spell.  


None of that made the news of Erica Reyes’ death any easier to swallow, for either Scott _or_ Derek.  


They sat across the table from each other and said nothing. Scott put his shield on the surface of it and just _stared_ at the bullet scarring that tore through all of the paint. He barely even noticed when Deaton entered the room. He found he didn’t _want_ to notice when Deaton started to speak.  


“Erica Reyes _believed_ in something, you know.” He noted, his voice quiet but hard, like there could be no space yielded by any of his words. “Maybe it was foolish. She always was a little bit idealistic. But she really _believed_ in this, believed it could _work_. A group of powerful individuals coming together to save the world?”  


Deaton paced the room quietly, seemingly oblivious as Derek’s face grew more and more distressed. “I guess she was misguided. It’s happened before.”  


There was more to that statement than Scott understood. It didn’t seem to matter, because _Derek_ understood it. He _growled_ , of all things, and the arc reactor settled in the center of his chest flared brighter for just a moment. Iron Wolf stood up, slamming both hands down on the table, and _stared_ at Deaton for a long, tense moment before he turned to leave the room.  


Tension stayed in the room behind him. Deaton watched the door for a few heartbeats before turning to tell Scott without any preamble, “Hale is the one who got Agent Reyes her job here at S.H.I.E.L.D.”  


Scott didn’t know what to say to that, or to any of it. He found himself nodding, standing from the table. He took his shield with reluctant hands as he left the room.  


Somehow, after wandering the halls for the better part of a half an hour, listening to radio chatter, he found himself standing in the empty room that had held the Hulk cell, exactly across from Derek.  


The impulse to speak, to _say_ something and try to _comfort_ Derek rose up in Scott’s chest. He took a few steps closer, wracking his brain for any kind of answer, and instead only came up with the fragile question, “Did you know her long?”  


“Since high school.” Derek didn’t even look up. He seemed to be transfixed by a spot across the room, staring at the metal grill beneath his feet. “She was good friends with my little sister. After school, she wanted to make a difference, so I introduced her to Deaton.”  


Scott frowned, silently, continuing to move around the large ring of the room towards Derek. “I didn’t even know you _have_ a sister.”  


The sound Derek made was ugly and unamused. He glanced up at Scott, apparently about to say _something else_ , but he reined it in at the last moment. Instead, he ended up noting in a bitter tone, “Well, I guess there’s a lot you don’t know about me. Or the rest of the team, for that matter.”  


The words stung, as Scott was sure they were meant to. They only stung more because of how fair, how _accurate_ they really were. All of the information that S.H.I.E.L.D. had given him on the others had been utilitarian, a rundown on their abilities and weaknesses and how they had gotten them, but nothing on the quirks and curiosities that made them _people_ rather than _assets_. Scott just hadn’t had the time to find those quirks out on his own. He wasn’t to proud to admit to himself that he hadn’t even really tried, with what time he’d _had_.  


And yet here was Derek in front of him, clearly hurting, clearly having cared more about this woman that Scott had barely had four conversations with than Scott had even given Derek credit for being capable of.of. _That_ was to Scott’s shame, too.  


He couldn’t make up for that, not now and not with all the pressure bearing down on them, but Scott could at least try to make up for it now. The words Talia Hale had told him once, in a bombed out French bar, rang through his head in echoes like a heavy bell. He stepped closer to Derek one more time, his voice quiet and low as he tried to offer comfort and absolution, “Derek. It wasn’t your fault that Erica died. She made her own decisions. Don’t hang that around your own neck.”  


Derek looked up, his expression tight-edged and complex. He smiled, without any of the elements a smile should have, and gave his head a tight shake. “Don’t. McCall. Don’t. Don’t stand there and pretend like you have any idea what this is like.”  


_Those_ words did more than just _sting_. They cut, bit deep into the core of him, gouging at a part of Scott that wasn’t even properly healed. More than anything else, they reminded him that while Scott didn’t know anything of substance about his ostensible co-workers, they didn’t know anything about _him_ , either. Derek had no idea what Scott had really _been_ through.  


He had no idea _who_ Scott had lost.  


The worst part was it wasn’t _Derek’s_ fault _either_. Scott swallowed back his unhappiness, the burning _loss_ that threatened to take up his whole chest. He closed his eyes and countered, more quiet than he wanted to be, “You’re wrong, Derek. I do understand. _Intimately_.”  


Silence stretched between them. Derek wouldn’t quite look at Scott’s face, his gaze constantly being pulled back to the place where Erica must have been as she died. The floor of the helicarrier deck thrummed and vibrated beneath their feet, all normal operation and entirely as if the assault and near-crash had never happened.  


“I don’t blame you.” Derek finally said, _finally_ looking back at Scott. Some part of him seemed to have closed off, or maybe just aged at some incredible, rapid pace, flinging Derek face-first into grim resignation. “I blame S.H.I.E.L.D. We can’t trust them. They’re not _trustworthy_. You saw the weapons they were prototyping. We aren’t _people_ to them. We’re tools. And the thing about tools is you use them to _make_ something, and we have no idea what it is they’re making, or if we want to be involved in it at all.”  


“Then we do this without their help.” Scott didn’t hesitate, didn’t flinch. Surprise flickered over Derek’s face, but Scott didn’t flinch from that, either. “If they can’t or won’t help us do the right thing, then we do the right thing on our own. The world out there is on the brink of invasion and it doesn’t even _know_ it. But we know. We can _do_ this, if you’re with me. We can find Loki and we can _stop him_ , and honor the sacrifice of people like Agent Reyes in the process.”  


Derek nodded, and gradually closed the space between himself and Scott. “You were right about Loki. To focus on him. We _should_ have been focusing on him. This was his plan, to pull us all apart, so that we couldn’t band together to stop him.”  


“We have to show him that he’s wrong. That we’ll band together despite the fact that he’s tried to tear at what’s supposed to hold us together.” Scott determined. He bowed his head a little, trying to scour through his wounded thoughts and unlock the puzzle of where Loki was headed. “Wherever he goes, Loki isn’t going to do this quietly. He _wants_ this to be personal. Not just for us, but for him. He wants everyone’s attention on him, he wants to be the center of it all, towering up over everyone else--”  


Derek startled, his whole body jolting up into a state of tension. “ _Son of a_ _ **bitch**_ _.”_  


Scott took a step back, already looking around the room like he was expecting another attack now that they’d let their vigilance slip for even the slightest moment. “What? _What is it?_ ”

 

The explanation came in the form of Derek grabbing at his shoulder, hand gripping hard at the cloth of Scott’s uniform, and starting to drag him out of the cell room. “I know where Loki’s getting his power source.”


	29. Chapter 29

To Scott’s surprise, they didn’t simply immediately leave for whatever untold destination Derek had in mind. Instead, Derek dragged him further into the bowels of the Helicarrier, to the quarters area.  


Straight to Allison’s quarters.  


The door slid open to reveal Allison herself, seated in a chair, leaning forward with her hands clasped over her knees. She looked up abruptly as the door opened, something a little wild in her dark eyes that could have easily turned into a killing edge.  


She didn’t turn it on either Scott or Derek. Instead, she softened it, blunted the edge enough so that she could turn it towards the other person in the room with her without harming him.  


On the edge of the bed was the exhausted-looking form of Isaac Lahey.  


Scott recognized him from the videos rather than familiarity, and almost too-quick to even process, he was bombarded with flashes of the images of what Hawkeye had _done_ , while under Loki’s mind-control. Scott sensed, rather than saw, Derek tense behind him.  


“He’s fine.” Allison assured them, tone firm and unyielding, the sort of tone that felt it might be challenged at any moment and was more than ready to rise to that challenge.  


Scott wasn’t going to challenge it. He met Isaac’s eyes without hesitation but without dominance. He didn’t question Isaac’s stability, nor Allison’s assessment of it. He just nodded, and asked in a voice far more calm than Scott actually felt, “Do you have a suit?”  


Isaac glanced between Scott and Allison, and then back again, barely allowing himself a blink before he nodded, too. “Yeah. I have a suit.”  


“Now’s the time to put it on.” Scott was pleased to see that Isaac didn’t hesitate. He stood, instead, and moved off to the side of the room. The rustling of clothing soon followed, and Scott politely turned his back to the sounds, attention on Allison instead.  


She looked tired and stressed, and like she just wanted to _sleep_ , which were all sentiments that Scott sympathized with deeply. Likewise, he knew just as deeply that they didn’t have the time and couldn’t afford to take it, so instead he found himself saying, “I need you to fly one of the quinjets. We know where Loki is going. We need to take the fight to him instead of letting him stay in control.”  


Allison nodded without comment and stood, clearly to check over the integrity of her uniform and paraphernalia. It wasn’t long before both she and Hawkeye were ready to go. The four of them wasted no time moving from the quarters to the hanger, where the quinjets waited for use.  


As they approached the nearest of the jets, one of the S.H.I.E.L.D. agents stepped out in front of them, one hand raised like he thought he might put a stop to what was obviously going to be a jet-jacking. Derek didn’t even flinch. He just walked right past the beleaguered pilot, speaking to the other three as they slowed. “I’m going ahead. Loki’s had way too much time to get set up at the Tower. He’s probably on the roof. You’re going to need to land as close as possible and come in from the ground level.”  


Without any other instructions, Derek turned and simply stepped right off of the edge of the open hangar door, the repulsor jets in his boots kicking in to propel him forward almost as soon as he was clear.  


Scott turned his attention to the pilot trying to prevent him, Hawkeye and Black Widow from leaving. “You probably just want to pretend you didn’t even see us.”  


The poor pilot blinked a few too many times. He looked Scott over, and then the other two, and slowly retracted his hand, fingers folding into his palm. He worked his mouth uselessly for a few seconds before he started to back away, silent and nodding. Scott was pleased to see there were still a few people in S.H.I.E.L.D. with some sense.  


They piled into the quinjet and rushed the launch sequence as much as possible. A few minutes later, they were exiting the hangar to the angry protests of someone on the helicarrier bridge. Allison grimaced and slapped the coms onto silent to spare them from the orders they certainly weren’t listening to anyway.  


The interior of the quinjet was tense and quiet. Isaac was more concerned with looking over the contents of his quiver and the condition of his bow, and Allison seemed focused on skimming over the city as low as she could dare, looking for a place near Hale Tower to land. Scott didn’t feel the need to disrupt either of them--in fact, he felt a _little_ like he was intruding on some kind of moment between them, so he occupied himself with peering out of the quinjet’s front screen. It was only happenstance, really, that inspired him to look up to the top of the Hale Tower.  


Happenstance that meant Scott was looking straight at the building when the bolt of electric-blue energy shot up from the very top of the Tower and started to collect into a sinister-looking whorl of cloud.

 

Before Scott could even _start_ to drag Isaac and Allison’s attention to that cloud, the radio cracked to life. It was Derek, his tone strained and unhappy. “Bad news. Loki’s already used the arc reactor in the Tower to boost the Tesseract and start the portal process. Even without the reactor, but it seems the Tesseract is already self-sufficient.”  


Dread settled down into the depth of Scott’s chest. His grip on the edge of his shield tightened. “So what you’re saying is that the portal is going to open up and there’s nothing we can do about it.”  


“Within minutes.” Derek replied. “Loki is still inside the Tower. I’m going to try to distract him. I’d recommend you guys get somewhere else.”  


Without even so much as a sound of dismay, Allison changed trajectory with the quinjet, circling until she found a place relatively nearby on the New York Streets to settle it, regardless of traffic’s needs. It wasn’t as messy a landing as it could have been, because there were already confused civilians slowing on the streets, looking up at the unnatural cloud gathering over the Hale Tower.  


Confused, innocent civilians who desperately needed to be _anywhere_ other than where they were _very soon_. Scott’s heart clenched. “We need to focus on containment and protecting the people. We have to trust that Hale can figure out how to shut this portal down.”  


The quinjet settled on the ground and its gangplank started to lower. They sprinted to the end of it only to be met by an angry member of the New York Police department, hands on his gunbelt in a gesture that was one thin inch from being an overt threat. “What do you think you’re doing? You can’t just _park_ this thing in the middle of the street! Who _are_ you?”  


Scott reached one hand out towards the officer, trying to look urgent and compassionate. He opened his mouth to explain, only to be interrupted by a terrible, striated noise washing out from the top of the Hale Tower.

All eyes turned towards the building.

A pulse of blue light reached up into the swirling cloud and _ripped it apart_. A howling noise filled the air, enough to hurt Scott’s ears, and then hundreds upon _hundreds_ of flying creatures began to pour out of the tear in the sky.


	30. Chapter 30

It was like watching the Plague of Locusts descend to wreck judgement on the world. The Chitauri flowed out of the portal and began to blanket the sky, a writhing, expanding cloud of darkness descending upon New York City. The whole city seemed to suck in a single breath, watching as the alien army descended upon it.  


Then the screaming started.  


Scott gave himself a metal shake by the scruff of his neck, dragging himself back into the moment. He had to focus. There were millions of people in New York alone that needed saving, _right now_. He had no time to be stunned, or horrified. Instead, he reached out to grasp the NYPD officer by one shoulder, voice urgent. “We have to protect the civilians! Call the National Guard, alert them to the situation. We need units in the buildings to facilitate civilian retreat, and a perimeter pushed way back, at least far as 39th.”  


The police officer seemed to realize Scott was still there, slowly, even as the first wave of Chitauri fighters washed over their heads. “Who the hell are you, giving orders like that?”  


Frustration inspired a growl, and Scott tugged at the officer’s shoulder until he was properly facing the tower. “You see that? You see all of those aliens coming out of that big _hole_ in the sky? They’re angry. They’re here to invade. They’re going to raze the city to the ground if we don’t stop them. I know who they are, and what they’re doing, and if anybody has a chance to _stop_ them, it’s me, and my team, but we can’t _do_ that if we have to evacuate the civilians! _Hurry_ , or people are going to die!”  


People had _already_ died, Scott was sure. He hadn’t seen it, he hadn’t heard it, but he _could_ hear the screaming and the sound of the Chitauri’s weaponry firing, all underpinned with the signature high-pitched whine of Tesseract-fueled energy. Another Chitauri flyer skimmed in far too close to their heads, and finally the police officer jarred into motion, tugging his shoulder from Scott’s hand so that he could start repeating the instructions Scott had given him into his radio.  


It was good enough, even if it wasn’t quite the acknowledgement he’d wanted. He had no time to worry about something like _that_ , either. Scott turned, beginning to sprint away from the quinjet towards ground zero, his teammates on his heels.  


Lightning struck out of the clear blue sky, centered on the chaos at the top of the Hale Tower.  


The Chitauri were already beginning an unmitigated assault on the buildings near the Tower. They didn’t discriminate between police or Avengers or civilians. They just opened fire on anything that moved, howling and shrieking at a level that made Scott’s skin crawl. He found himself growling in response, his speed increasing.  


“Cap, we can’t run like you can!” Hawkeye called from behind him, voice strained.  


Almost on top of that, Black Widow yelled, just as urgent, “Get down!”  


It was reflex that had Scott snapping his legs out from under him, dropping to the ground. A squadron of Chitauri scored over the street, weapons firing constantly. At the front point of their formation was Loki, gleeful and laughing, perforating the street from his flyer with blasts from his scepter.  


Scott felt the roar build in his chest, but he refused to let it out. He just let his hand ball into a slow fist against the road, digging gouges into the asphalt with his claws. “We can’t let him do this.”  


“Well, we--” Black Widow started, but whatever she was in the midst of saying was drowned out by a sound like a freight train being put through a wood chipper.  


Scott scrambled to his feet to look back at the Tower, just in time for an impossibly enormous creature to come slithering out of the portal. Its body was thickly armored, longer and more massive than the same freight train its screech sounded like. It looked as if some terrible eel had swum up from the dark abyss of the ocean just to crossbreed with a whale and produce a chitinous, terrible thing with too many spines, too many fins, and too many needle-like teeth. It writhed its way down from the portal, immediately slamming into the side of a nearby building and tearing chunks of masonry free.  


Scott’s heart sank through the pit of his stomach. “Mother of--”  


Derek’s voice broke in through the radio, and Scott could see the flare of Iron Wolf’s repulsor jets as he circled around the leviathan, a tiny speck compared to its bulk. “Alright, Cap, Thor is on her way down. Where’s Dunbar? I think he and this thing should be _friends_.”  


“I haven’t seen him since the attack on the helicarrier. I have to assume we’re alone on this.” Scott responded, watching in horror as the alien creature banked to follow Derek and tore out several floors of another building.  


“Not a great plan. I’ll keep this thing busy. You see if you can’t get Dunbar’s attention. Let me know.”  


Any lingering doubts Scott had about being able to _find_ Liam in this maelstrom were washed away by the sound of Chitauri rushing them on the street. They moved quickly, but clumsily, more like gorillas than like men, and with the same promise of unreasonable strength. They weren’t going to hesitate, so neither could the Avengers.  


Scott met the first of the line shield-first, slamming it up into the Chitauri’s faceplate until he heard something crack. The alien stumbled backwards, losing its grip on its weapon, which Scott immediately wrapped his free hand around and _jerked_ backwards, tearing it free of the Chitauri entirely. He tossed it to his side almost without verifying where it was going, but of course Black Widow was there, ready to receive it. She spun it around and seemed to take no time at all to determine how to fire it, point-black like a shotgun, straight into the gut of the next alien in line.  


The third fell to one of Hawkeye’s arrows buried in its skull.  


They fought like they’d trained for years together, like they’d been _meant_ to fight together, Scott taking the brunt of attacks with his shield, Black Widow and Hawkeye constantly on the move, neatly downing Chitauri after Chitauri. It was brutal, efficient.  


It just also wasn’t enough.  


They were going to be overwhelmed sooner rather than later. Scott couldn’t bring himself to say anything, but he knew that Hawkeye and Black Widow knew it too. There were just _too many_ , wave after endless wave of angry Chitauri willing to sacrifice themselves on the altar of Loki’s ambition. They needed some alternative, or their stamina would break far sooner than the horde of Chitauri would.  


The alternative came in the form of a literal bolt of lightning. It struck the nearest cluster of Chitauri and blasted outward in a shockwave, knocking aliens back like dominoes thrown by an angry child. Moments later, Thor landed in the street, hammer humming as she whirled it in one hand. She straightened and met Scott’s eyes, puffing hair out of her face with her mouth. “...Hey.”  


“...Hey.” Scott echoed.  


“There is an energy barrier surrounding the Tesseract. I could not penetrate it. It may not be _possible_ to penetrate.” She continued, taking advantage of a brief lull in the fighting to look back at the Hale Tower.  


“It’s possible,” A new voice called from down the street. Scott turned, breathing heavy, to look over his shoulder and discover Liam Dunbar picking his way through the burning ruin of the cars that had been parked along the street earlier. “It’s just a matter of finding the right tool.”  


The expression that Malia gave Liam was one of barely restrained impatience, so Scott intervened, desperate to keep the conversation on track before they got overwhelmed by another wave of enemies. “What kind of tool would be the right kind?”  


Liam finally made his way to Scott’s side and drew himself up to his full height. He looked exhausted, weary both mentally and physically, but beyond that he looked resigned to inevitably. “It’s an alien source of power. We need an alien tool, the same kind of thing the Tesseract is.”  


Scott’s mind was devoid of ideas, but Allison’s spine straightened faintly, her eyes widening. “ _Loki’s scepter_.”  


Again, Derek’s voice crackled in over the radio. He sounded more inconvenienced than anything, but Scott could tell it was just a mask, like the faceplate on his armor, meant to cover over his real emotions. “Cap, have you found Dunbar yet?”  


“He just showed up. He had an idea on how to get through to that portal.” Scott replied, turning his face to the sky instinctively, to try and locate where Iron Wolf had gone.  


“That’s great. We need to talk about that _later_ , because right now, I have an extremely pissed off giant war eel chasing me, and I’m bringing it your way. You might want to let Dunbar know.”  


From near the Hale Tower, Iron Wolf swung into view, moving as fast as his repulsors could propel him. Just seconds later, the leviathan came crashing through a turn, hot in pursuit.  


From behind him, Scott could hear Liam suck in a sudden breath. “That thing’s _huge_.”  


Scott couldn’t argue the point. He slid half a step backwards, watching as Iron Wolf flew low, taunting the monster towards the ground, where its armored spines tore into the street and surrounding buildings and churned them up. “Yeah. You might want to consider--”  


“Yeah.” Liam agreed, turning towards the approaching terror, “Wolfing out.”  


Iron Wolf skimmed over their heads at full velocity, barely high enough to avoid clipping Hawkeye’s head. He twisted in the air once he was past the rest of the team, weaponry trained on the leviathan.  


The leviathan roared again, the sound so loud and terrible in close quarters that Scott thought his head might actually just split apart rather than accommodate it.  


Liam took a single step forward and simply _changed_.  


His form grew suddenly, exponentially, clothes splitting around his limbs as they gained mass and size. Fur sprouted from every part of Liam’s body, all an unnaturally bright shade of green. By the time the leviathan had closed with him, Liam wasn’t _Liam_ anymore, but _the Hulk_ , twelve feet tall and lupine, with a ferocious snarl fixed on his muzzle.  


The Hulk leapt at the leviathan with preternatural strength, the wicked claws of both hands extended. He slammed down on its head, just behind the massive armor plating, with bone-crushing force, immediately digging deep with his claws. Armor plating flew in every direction, and the leviathan screeched in pain, its head and forebody slamming several feet into the ground.  


Momentum carried the leviathan’s long body forward, crushing it against the stalled head. It all stacked up vertically, height rivaling the buildings nearby, and then began to fall forward, inverting the creature.  


The Hulk kept tearing through the leviathan’s neck until he’d torn its head off completely.  


The body fell as if in slow motion into the ruin of the street. Scott rushed in close to Allison, tugging her into a crouch with one hand while he sheltered her body from the shrapnel with his shield and his body. Across the chaos of the falling beast, he could see Derek protecting Isaac.  


Finally, the leviathan’s body came to a stop, and in the absence of the crashing cacophony, the silence was almost deafening.  


That didn’t last long--their defeat of the enormous warbeast had attracted attention. Hundreds of Chitauri lined the buildings nearby, hovering on their flyers and clinging to the architecture. They stared down at the Avengers for three or four heartbeats too long before, as seemingly one mind, they began to scream their rage down from the rooftops.

Neither Scott nor the Hulk hesitated. Standing back to back with their team in the wreckage, they both roared their defiance in return.


	31. Chapter 31

The sound passed through the city like a tangible thing, echoed by scores of angry Chitauri. Everything seemed to hang in some kind of terrible balance, waiting on something or someone to flinch and let the chaos back out of the bottle. All of the hair on the back of Scott’s neck and arms rose.  


“Well,” Allison said, her voice quiet like she was trying to prevent an avalanche, “I think they know we’re here, now.”  


“ _Yeah_ ,” Derek’s voice filtered in through his mask, equal parts exhausted and annoyed. “The question is, what are we doing to do with that?”  


All eyes turned to Scott and he felt the weight of them settle onto the burden of his shoulders. He was still breathing heavily, his features still twisted from his Alpha shift, but he straightened his spine and nodded, just once. “Widow. Are you sure you can get that scepter from Loki?”  


Allison nodded in response, resolve hardening her features. “I’ve got the best chance of anyone here. If I don’t get it up there, we’re all screwed _anyway_.”  


Something inside of Scott was convinced that was true no matter what angle they looked at it from, but the rest of him refused to give up. It sounded suspiciously like Stiles, rallying in the back of his mind, shouting that he couldn’t give up now, not after he’d come so far and done so much. He swallowed down his doubts and instead turned to address the rest of the team. “Okay. Black Widow, that’s your objective. I’ll cover you on the ground. Iron Wolf, I need you to get Hawkeye to higher ground, and then I need you on air support. Thor, you need to distract Loki for long enough to give Widow a chance at that scepter. Try to be a messy a distraction.”  


Lastly, he dragged his eyes to the great, green _beast_ that Liam had become. His ears were pinned back against his skull, lip curled to show one side of his teeth, but there was still something canny in his eyes. Scott had no real option but to believe that Liam was still in there somewhere, able to channel the sheer destructive energy of his alter ego into something advantageous for their side. Scott’s chin dropped as he gave the command. “And Hulk? _Smash_.”  


Somehow, the huge green wolf’s snarl turned into something more like a _grin_ , and he turned to launch himself into the air with a mighty bound.  


The rest of the team followed suit; Thor swung her hammer in a few blurred, tight circles before flinging it into the air and dragging herself behind it, Iron Wolf came around to grasp Hawkeye ignobly from behind and zip him straight to the top of the skyline, where he could get a vantage point on the fight. Scott could tell the moment he _had_ , because Isaac’s voice came over the com sounding terse. “Cap, there’s a _lot_ of them out here. Like, way more than we can deal with a lot.”  


Scott ground his fangs together, so briefly. “I know. Just do what you can. Our primary objective is to get Black Widow that scepter.”  


In that moment, it seemed, the Chitauri knew their fragile truce to be over. The flood descended upon them, and there was no more time for thinking.  


It was all they could do to hold the line, fighting back to back without thought or hesitance. Scott slammed his shield into the face of one of the incoming aliens only to recoil long enough for Allison to shoot it over the line of his shoulder. He slashed out with his claws as she reloaded and freed up one of alien’s own weapons just to replace the one Allison had been using as it stopped responding. They continued like that, like a heartbeat and just as reflexive, working together in a near-perfect synergy that he hadn’t felt since--  


\--well, he didn’t have time to think about _that_.  


Scott had no idea how long they worked like that, had no time to count the bodies starting to pile up in front of them. He slipped into some kind of fighting void, thinking of nothing but the next motion, how to support Allison’s movements, how to best cripple or eliminate the enemies crowding around on them from all sides. Any time he let himself _start_ to think, all that he could consider were all of the people in the buildings that the Chitauri swarmed, and how they faced no chance at all if the Avengers didn’t stop this invasion _here_ , and _now_.  


Hawkeye’s voice cut in through the endless combat, loud in Scott’s shifted ear. “Heads up, here we go!”  


Scott snapped his head up just in time to see Hawkeye loose an arrow at one of the flying chariots overhead. The rider lurched to the side, catching the arrow, and in that moment Scott could see it was Loki. He shook his head at Hawkeye, but before Scott’s heart could sink with disappointment, the arrow _exploded_ , flinging Loki from his chariot.  


The scepter fell the other way.  


Thor streaked in from the side to catch Loki before he could hit the ground, lightning crackling in her wake. Loki’s scepter fell end over end, burying itself tip-first in the street a few yards away.  


Allison turned to look at him, eyes intent, breathing heavily, “I’ll need a ride.”  


Scott’s answer was a curt nod as Allison turned to sprint towards the scepter. One of the Chitauri got there first, but Scott couldn’t afford to watch the exchange of blows. He had to trust that someone as highly trained as Black Widow would be able to hold her own. _Scott_ had his own task to do.  


Two or three chariots flew overhead before he managed to get the timing down. His heartbeat picked up as he considered the risky mechanics of how to get Allison onto the chariots, but they really had no other option. They were already overrun. When Allison turned back towards him, scepter in hand, he bellowed at the top of his lungs, “ _RUN!_ ”  


Run, Allison did. She ran _straight at him_ , which was exactly what Scott had intended. He listened to the rhythm of her footsteps, nodding with each one, watching the way she coiled like a pouncing cat and _launched_ herself at him once she was close enough.  


Scott dropped to one knee, shield up. Allison landed with her lead foot on the shield, and Scott _heaved_ , putting his entire body weight and enhanced strength into reversing Allison’s momentum and flinging her into the air.  


Her body traveled in a smooth arc as she flipped backwards, one hand still clutching that scepter. As she still hung in the air, upside-down, Scott _threw_ his shield, barely skating it through the space beneath her. It slammed edge-first into the Chitauri on the next chariot and dragged him off of the vehicle with its momentum.  


Like the prima in a graceful ballet, Allison landed on the suddenly vacant chariot. Her flight was erratic for a few yards, before she seemed to get the hang of the controls and she evened out, swiftly turning to arc upwards towards the top of the Hale Tower. Scott couldn’t do anything about the pursuit that peeled off behind her.  


Luckily, Iron Wolf _could_. He swirled up behind Black Widow in a smear of red and gold, picking off the Chitauri following her so that she could continue to make progress.  


Nearly all of the aliens that he and Black Widow had been fighting on the street had refocused their attention to other members of the Avengers. The moment of quietude wasn’t helpful; it just made Scott feel angry, filled him with despair that they would be able to actually _do_ this, or save the city that had already been so damaged by the fight.  


Naturally, it was right at the moment that feeling threatened to dig its talons into his heart that Hawkeye came in over the radio once again. “Cap. There’s a bank about a block and a half ahead of you. There’s a lot of civilians pinned down in there--”

  
Scott closed his eyes, took a deep breath in, and then interrupted Isaac mid-statement. “I’m on it.”


	32. Chapter 32

Those civilians rapidly became the only thing Scott could focus on in the chaos of battle. He strained his ears for their cries, their terrified breathing, their rapid heartbeats, digging the sounds out from under the sounds of the Chitauri and holding them in the front of his mind like a beacon. Swinging his shield over to his back, Scott dropped onto all fours and began to _sprint_ , a blur of blue and red and white and determination.  


He tore through the Chitauri forces trying to hold him back, and skidded the last few feet in front of the bank, only to turn sharply and dive straight through one of the plate glass windows that dominated the front of the building. Scott could feel the shards cut into his face as he went, biting at the weak places of his suit, but he ignored it and instead landed in a roll, coming up shield-first into the middle of the lobby with a snarl.  


Four of the Chitauri grunts had the terrified civilians pinned down in a corner of the bank lobby. The room reeked of fear and char and blood, but Scott had no time to track down the sources. Instead, he had to focus on the aliens turning to react to his entrance, bristling with malice and weaponry.  


The world seemed to slow down as the first Chitauri lunged at him with the front of its oversized rifle. Scott snarled, letting the sound come up from the depths of his chest, and ducked under the rifle in one fluid motion. He came up inside the alien’s guard, knocking its weapon wide with his shield, and followed through with his claws, digging them into the soft flesh of the alien’s throat and chest, carefully aiming the blow between the sections of the alien’s armoring. It tore away easily, a thick, foul-smelling ichor pouring out of the wound. Like before, Scott claimed the Chitauri’s weapon as the alien began to crumple, clutching at its throat.  


He held the weapon in both hands, pivoting on his heel just enough to give himself the right angle and momentum to drive the wicked blade at the front of the gun into the next grunt. It sunk into the alien right up to the barrel of the rifle section, where it caught against the Chitauri’s armoring and stopped moving. Scott didn’t try to force it. Instead, he braced his weight against the weapon itself and used it as an anchoring point in order to kick the third grunt four or five times in rapid succession. Each blow landed heavily, powered by Scott’s superhuman strength and the weight of his lower body, and by the time he’d landed the _last_ of them, the grunt was down for the count, sprawling limply on the floor.  


Scott turned back to the grunt he held impaled on the weapon and _snarled_ as he squeezed the trigger.  


The weight of the alien on the other end of the weapon began to drag it out of his hands as it fell, and Scott let go of the rifle entirely rather than struggle to recover it. He turned to the last remaining Chitauri just long enough to take the blade of the Chitauri’s rifle in the meaty part of his shoulder.  


He could feel it skate along his ribcage, skipping against the bone like a stone on the water. It was _agonizing_ , but like everything else he endured--Scott would heal. The people still trapped behind the remaining invader _wouldn’t_ heal, if he left the fight now just because he was in pain. He couldn’t allow that. Scott would _never_ allow that.  


So he slid a step backwards, pulling himself off of the weaponry blade with a wet _schlick_ of sound.  


Growling again, Scott came back in at the Chitauri with his shield, trying to shelter as much of his body behind it as would fit, until his other shoulder could knit itself back together. He slammed the shield into the alien’s face over and over again, until he finally knocked it off of its balance. It was the smallest of flinches, just a moment of disorientation, but it was enough for Scott. He turned his shield on its side and used the edge to cut a deep line into the Chitauri’s neck. It fell, clutching its wound, in much the same way as the first one did.  


In the wake of the fighting, the bank lobby seemed deathly silent. At first, all Scott could hear was the sound of his own breathing, rushing noisily through his lungs like an echo of the asthma he’d left behind him in the 1930s. It wasn’t until he’d caught it again that the other sounds started to filter in: the dull thud and shriek of the battle outside, the heartbeats of the civilians in the room with him, the sniffle and cry of a young child with her face hidden in her mother’s shirt, too scared to keep quiet.  


Scott drew a long breath in. He held it in his lungs for a slow five count. Then, he let it out again, and rolled his eyes open.  


“I’m Captain America.” Scott’s voice was far more steady than he felt, warm and commanding. He felt the eyes of all of the civilians turn to him, terrified and distrustful. He did his best to look nonthreatening, all too aware of the fact that he was still covered in blood and other evidence of battle. “I’m here to evacuate you. There’s a line of containment not too far from here. I can get you there.”  


There were ten of them, once they were all standing, looking shaky and pale. Most of them were adults, except for the one little girl clinging to her mother. She couldn’t have been more than five, and although her mother wasn’t the tallest of women, she still picked the girl up, a look of grim determination leveled at Scott over her daughter’s hair. Scott recognized that look as one of a parent who was _going_ to get her child to safety no matter the cost. Scott was equally determined to make that happen for her.  


Scott turned and used this shield to batter out the rest of the glass in the window he’d jumped through, until it was safe enough for the civilians to exit more or less in one group. He gathered them up like ducklings, trying to put the people at the most risk in the center of them, and after three short, unhappy apologies, Scott got them all trotting at a brisk pace towards the containment line. It felt like it was too many blocks away, through the chaos that has been made of the streets near the Hale Tower, and Scott was all too aware of the fact that he was only one man, trying to protect ten non-combatants.  


Somehow, maybe for the first time since he’d chosen to take the serum and become _Captain America_ , fortune favored Scott. The Chitauri largely remained distracted by the fight with the other Avengers, and Scott managed to evacuate the civilians to the containment line with a minimum of fighting. The amount of relief he felt as he watched the mother and her young child retreat into the safety of the police and military was immense.  


He turned back to look at the devastation closer to the Hale Tower. It all felt like so _much_ , like the stone tumbling from the facades of the buildings was tumbling down straight into his shoulders to weigh him down. It felt so much like he had personally failed the city, somehow, and all of the people he _knew_ to beneath the rubble, that he _couldn’t_ save and bring to the containment line, were _his responsibility_. The Chitauri swarmed over the buildings near the rift, and for a moment, Scott felt despair crush down on him.  


Before it could flatten him completely, Allison’s voice cut in over the radio. She sounded like she would have been afraid or harried if she was anyone else, but she was _The Black Widow_ , and so she came across almost too-casual as she explained, “I’m at the portal. I have the sceptre. I’m through the force field. I could close it!”  


Without hesitation, Scott growled the command, conviction coming up from the pit of his stomach. “ _Do it_.”  


No one argued. There wasn’t even a sound of confirmation from Allison. There was just the sudden sound, like a rushing waterfall being pulled down a drain. It roared, and then fizzled, and then cut out all at once. The portal winked closed.  


In the wake of the portal, the Chitauri began to collapse.  


There was no other way for Scott to explain it. They just _stopped_ , as if they were all a single unit, paused on the edge of action in the way a hunting dog might, waiting for an order from its master.  


Yet, with the portal shut and the tesseract shut down, there were no orders coming. In a circular wave washing out from the center point of the Hale Tower, the aliens fell, _literally_ fell, dropping to the ground as if somebody had just pulled their batteries out. Scott wondered if that wasn’t actually _true_ , somehow, if maybe the horde of Chitauri were nothing more than elaborate wind-up toys animated by the power of the Tesseract itself.  


Ultimately, it didn’t really seem to matter. What mattered was that it was over, and the threat neutralized. New York would be as safe as it had ever been.  


Once more, Allison’s voice dominated his comm device. “Loki has been taken into custody and his army neutralized. Black Widow requesting immediate high-security extract at penthouse of the Hale Tower.”  


Deaton’s voice replied, as infuriatingly calm as ever. “Acknowledged. Agents are on the way.”

  
The silence after Deaton’s words washed over Scott like a tidal wave. He closed his eyes and dropped his shoulders, trying to let it sweep him away.


	33. Chapter 33

The aftermath was strangely subdued, for how much chaos the invasion had brought.  


Scott wasn’t even really sure what he’d expected. He supposed he hadn’t seen the end of the _war_ , either. He had no idea how these things were mopped up, how normal life reasserted itself after catastrophe.  


As it turned out, if S.H.I.E.L.D. was involved, the answer was as quickly and quietly as possible. Negotiations happened with a near ruthless efficiency. Loki was given over to Thor’s custody along with the Tesseract. Scott had watched them leave in a pulse of blue light, Loki’s mouth covered in a muzzle that unsettled Scott more than it comforted him. New York stitched itself together with an efficiency that he’d only ever seen in his own skin, torn and tattered pieces of the city rebuilt faster than should be _possible_.  


It was unnerving. A week out from the battle, it was as if it hadn’t been at all. No one in the city talked about it. No one acknowledged it in the least. No one acted as if anything had been changed, no one seemed to want to talk about or even _note_ that things _had_ changed, the city had changed and _life_ in it had changed, no matter how many times they put new coats of paint on it.  


All of it felt too familiar. It felt too _personal_.  


Everything had changed too much. New York had changed too much. _Scott_ had changed too much. For the first time in his entire life, the city didn’t feel like _home_. Nothing about it was comforting or familiar. It was strange and alien, like the body he’d found himself in after the serum, and there was nothing left in it but the ghosts of what should have been.  


Scott was tired to his bones of ghosts. He needed someplace less haunted.  


Two weeks after the battle, Scott requested a relocation from S.H.I.E.L.D. Two weeks and a day after the battle, he was moving to an apartment in Washington D.C.  


In many ways, DC was everything New York wasn’t, and _wasn’t_ so many things that New York _was_. Its skyline clawed less at the sky; instead the capital chose to keep its secrets clutched closer to its chest. Scott could appreciate that, after everything he’d been through.  


The apartment they gave him was small, but nestled close to the National Mall, near the Lincoln Memorial, it was still far more indulgence than Scott needed. He tried not to think about how much money a different person would have to hand over to stay in a place like that, so close to the White House and the heart of the American governmental system.  


So close to S.H.I.E.L.D.’s Triskelion headquarters.  


If anyone in DC recognized him as the nationally-celebrated _Captain America_ , none of them saw fit to bother him about it. Scott could leave his apartment at dawn and stay out well past sunset, most days without anyone stopping him on the sidewalk for anything, let alone for photographs or autographs or anything like _that_. It felt almost like settling back into being that skinny, asthmatic kid from Brooklyn that nobody knew or ever took second notice of.  


The only problem was, the one person who had always been there to make that kind of anonymity tolerable was long, long gone.  


There was no getting it back. Like every other moment in his life, there was only _moving forward_. Luckily for Scott, there was a lot of convenient space in the National Mall for moving forward, every day, for multiple laps.  


Running was another one of those things that was foreign to his life pre-serum, but unlike so many of the radical changes he’d endured, Scott actually enjoyed it. He could make the circuit around the Reflecting Pool and the Lincoln Memorial at least a dozen times at something close to a sprint without even feeling the _smallest_ bit out of breath. He could detach and escape his own thoughts for a while in the rhythm and repetition of his stride, his feet on the pavement, the same quiet, calm scenery in the early morning.  


In the same man he passed several times a morning, taking the same circuit at a pace _not_ amplified by the werewolf super-serum.  


Scott could tell that every lap that brought him past this man frustrated the man, but he wasn’t sure there was anything he could do about it which would still give him the same sense of limit-pushing as keeping his admittedly far-superior pace. He ended up swinging around on the outside of the guy from the Reflecting Pool, calling a little too-loud but very heartfelt, “On your left, sorry!”  


Most days, the man ignored him. Some days, the man wasn’t even there, and Scott almost felt a sense of loss on those days for the broken pattern.  


Then, maybe inevitably, there was the day that the pattern broke for a different reason.  


Scott was in the process of swinging around to pass the man for what must have been at least the third time in that morning’s session alone, calling out his habitual warning, when he heard the man mutter, less under his breath than maybe he intended, “Yeah, uh-huh, _okay_ , I get it. On my left. _Real_ sorry about it.”  


It was just enough to attract Scott’s attention without being enough for him to think much of it. By the time he’d lapped the guy, he’d forgotten entirely about it, or at least until he could hear him demanding as Scott approached, “Don’t say it, don’t you say it!”  


Naturally, Scott breezed past him at the same speed as any of the other times, declaring as he had every other time, “On your left, sorry!”  


As he pulled away, Scott could hear the man shout behind him, pace increasing like he thought he could catch up to Scott. “Are you kidding me?!”  


He didn’t come anywhere close before he gave up, gasping, but the effort somehow amused Scott anyway. He found himself grinning as he finished his lap.  


When he came back around again, the man was seated beneath a tree on the other side of the path, arms resting on his knees, head down between his shoulders. He looked up to meet Scott’s eyes as Scott approached, and Scott determined to take it as an unspoken invitation. He slowed his sprint to a jog, and then a walk, and then Scott was standing just a few feet from the other man, hands on his hips, wincing faintly. “Should I get you a bottle of water, maybe, to show I’m _really_ sorry?”  


“Yeah, _sure_ , do that, maybe also an O2 tank and mask, so I can finally catch my breath. Do you have any idea how _humanly impossible_ your lap count should be? How do you _do_ that?” The other jogger _was_ still breathing heavily, looking up at Scott with a softly awed expression.  


Something in Scott’s gut sunk lower. The other man was right; his speed and endurance _were_ both humanly _impossible_ , a result of his being _something other than human_ now. He’d gotten so comfortable with no one knowing that about him, and now faced with the observation, Scott realized how deeply he didn’t want to have to explain it, and ruin that facade of normalcy. “I, uh, well, _uh_ , that’s--”  


The man breathed out something like a laugh, and started to push himself up to his feet. He had a hand offered for shaking before he was halfway up. “Nah, man, don’t worry about it, I’m just messing with you. I know who you are, I know why. It’s just a little bit disheartening. I’ll get over it, though. I’m Mason Hewitt.”  


Entirely as if Mason hadn’t _just_ told Scott he knew who he was, Scott introduced himself, using the handshake to help pull Mason to his feet. “Scott McCall.”  


“Nice to actually meet you, Captain.” Mason said, all heartfelt intensity, turning immediately into Scott’s rank in a way natural only to those forged on the military’s anvil.  


It led Scott to make a quiet noise in his throat as he dropped his hand back to his side, chin lifting up. “So what unit are you with?”  


As if he was recognizing the shift in the conversation, Mason immediately settled his weight on the balls of his feet. He clasped his hands behind him, every image of parade rest except the restfulness. “58th Rescue Squadron. Pararescue. But I work for the VA now.”  


“How have you been settling back into stateside life?” Scott hazarded the question, gently, after a moment of wistful tension after Mason mentioned the VA. Normally he wouldn’t have been even _that_ invasive with his question, but something about the other soldier’s attitude made Scott think there might be something more similar than even just the surface struggle of being military men of color in an unkind world.  


Mason shrugged. “It’s… good. Mostly. I mean, not being shot at constantly has a lot to be said for it. I feel more like I’m helping people, back here. My bed’s soft. But there’s something weird about that, you know? Like it isn’t real, and I’ll just wake up any moment and be back _there_ , so I can’t really let myself get comfortable with what’s _here_ , even if I know this is how things _are_ , now.”  


Scott let out a long, slow sigh, his eyebrows lifting. “ _Yeah_. I know...I know _exactly_ how you feel.”  


He wanted to continue the conversation, _badly_. It felt like the first genuine connection Scott had started to make in--well, he supposed it was technically _decades_ , even though for _him_ it felt like a year at most. He _wanted_ to make a friend. He might have even been willing to slow his running pace if it could have meant _a companion_ again.  


Of course, it was exactly that moment that Scott’s phone buzzed, the tone a particular, urgent one reserved exclusively for important S.H.I.E.L.D. messages. Scott pulled the phone out of his pocket to peer at its screen.  


_Urgent mission. Deploying immediately. Behind you, 2 minutes_.  


His fingers tightened briefly around the phone, but not enough to damage it. Instead, Scott sighed and slid it back into his pocket. His whole face was as apologetic as he could make it as he looked back up to Mason. “Listen, uh. Duty’s calling. But, uhm. Maybe if you wanted a jogging partner next time--”  


Mason laughed, seemingly split between genuinely amused and genuinely surprised. “I couldn’t keep up with you if you strapped rockets to my feet, but I appreciate your confidence, Captain. We’ll figure something out. Clear skies on your mission.”  


Barely even _half_ of the projected two minutes had passed when Scott heard the car pull up to the curb behind them, with a familiar heartbeat at the helm. He pulled his lips into his mouth for a smile that was more a grimace than what it was supposed to be, and gave Mason one last, grateful nod. “Thanks. See you then.”  


Allison had already leaned over and opened the door of her car for him by the time Scott got to the curb. “People should stop leaving ancient relics just laying around like this, just anybody could come and pick them up off of the curb.”  


Scott snorted, unamused, as he dropped into the seat of the car and pulled the door shut again. “You’re gonna have to try harder than that, Argent, I’ve been thawed for like six months and I’ve already heard some variation on that joke at least seven times.”

  
The laughter Allison indulged in as they pulled away from the curb didn’t at all reflect the fact that they were, undoubtedly, going off to war again.


	34. Chapter 34

The conversation Scott had with Allison on the way to the mission briefing was of no real consequence to anything, and therefore an enormous relief to a stress he’d only really started feeling again since she texted him. It was nice to pretend he had time or space in his life for catching up with movies he’d missed in the last _so many_ years, or considering the possibility of asking out _Annie from Accounting_ whom Allison assured him was _very_ nice and _super_ into him.  


He was sure both of those things were accurate, but Scott felt unsettled in an undefinable way any time he thought of even _trying_ to date anyone.  


It was a perverse sort of luck that meant Scott didn’t have time to even be thinking of that while being briefed on his mission.  


They’d been picked up by a quinjet at the Triskelion headquarters, crammed full of S.H.I.E.L.D.’s top deep extraction team, complete with their commander Ennis. Scott wasn’t sure if Ennis was his first or last name. No one had ever really clarified that, and Scott hadn’t had much of a chance to _ask_ for clarification. The only time he really saw Ennis or the rest of the so-called Wolf Squad was when they were about to deploy.  


Like now. It just wouldn’t be appropriate to interrupt Ennis as he bent over one of the control panels of the quinjet, explaining the situation to Scott and Allison without any preamble.  


“Approximately ninety minutes ago, the mobile satellite launch platform _The Lemurian Star_ was  captured by pirates while launching a satellite in the Indian Sea. Last contact indicates fifteen hostages--fourteen platform techs and one on-site S.H.I.E.L.D. officer, Jasper Sitwell.” Ennis explained, pulling up individual pictures of the techs and a slightly larger one of Sitwell. “Best guess there’s around twenty five of them. The pirates are being led by a man named Georges Batroc, ex-special forces, Belgian. He’s got a bloodthirsty reputation. We’ll be lucky if all the hostages are still in one piece.”  


Those were words that Scott never liked to hear. He frowned, leaning forward to try and see the information on the screen better. “Do they have any demands? What was the point of this?”  


“They want one point five billion dollars.”  


The number made Scott’s head spin.  From behind him, Allison noted, with a dryness to her voice that reminded Scott of Stiles, “...wow, _that’s_ a little steep.”  


Ennis narrowed his eyes and looked back over his shoulder at Allison. “It’s a S.H.I.E.L.D. platform. Of course they set a high price.”  


“They can’t possibly have thought they were going to _get_ that much money, even out of S.H.I.E.L.D.” Scott frowned, finally having found his tongue again only to criticize the plan of hostage-holding pirates.  


Ennis just shrugged, his head shaking, and responded with, “We’ll be on-site in two. You better get ready for the drop.”  


There was no need to explain what that meant. They’d done this before, just enough times for Scott to be used to it, without it being common enough for him to actually enjoy the experience. He glanced up to the rest of the strike force, then to Allison, and nodded. “I’ll focus on Batroc and distracting as many of his men as I can. Ennis, you and the Wolf Squad should focus on extracting the hostages with as few casualties as possible. Allison, you go hamstring the platform’s engines so nobody goes anywhere unexpected while we’re doing this.”  


Black Widow and Ennis both made noises of affirmation, and Scott nodded again in response, moving off to the back of the quinjet to prepare for his jump.  


The jet was meant for stealth, invisible to most radar. It meant they could come in low, under the cover of a cloudy night, and buzz the _Lemurian Star_ as slowly as it could manage without being in VTOL mode. For anyone else, this maneuver would have been suicide, but for Scott, it was just a little hard on his knees.  


As the quinjet made its first pass, Scott trotted slowly out to the back, opened the hatch, and jumped out of the plane.  


The wind pulled at him as he fell, unimpeded by anything as hasty as a _parachute_. Scott actually appreciated being able to drops like this--every time, there was a moment of peace, of _solitude_ , of being completely disconnected from the world and all its pains. Sometimes, he thought he would just live in perpetual freefall if he could get away with it.  


Unfortunately, gravity was a reality Scott couldn’t avoid. As he neared the deck of the _Lemurian Star,_ Scott began to be able to make out the figures of pirates on patrol, dressed in dark assault gear and heavily armed. It so happened that one of them was unfortunate enough to wander under Scott’s trajectory just as he came back to earth.  


So Scott landed on the guy’s shoulders, knees on either side of his head, and rode his momentum down to the deck with the pirate as passing. He rolled off the excess of that momentum the moment he could pitch forward, ignoring the pain of his screaming joints as he did so. He was also ignoring how the pirate he’d landed on _wasn’t moving_ as a result of being used as an impromptu landing pad.  


Scott kept moving, because stillness meant death in a situation like this. He kept low to the deck as he circled around, honing in on the heartbeat of the next patrolling pirate with ease. He’d thrown his shield before the man had ever realized he was there, rebounding it off of the pirate’s head with a muffled thud. The noise of him hitting the deck as Scott caught his shield attracted the attention of a third man. Scott launched himself, still crouching, at the man’s legs, and tackled him do the ground before he could react. A lightning-quick punch with just a little of werewolf strength, and the man’s head had rebounded off of the metal decking with enough force to knock him out.  


Scott swung his shield around in front of him and crept forward, hopping down onto a lower level of the deck where three more of the pirates waited. Scott landed in the middle of them, already spinning to slam the middle of his shield into the side of the first one’s head. He staggered, but didn’t go down, and Scott had to follow up with another strike from his free hand to take him out. It ruined the flow of his combat, meant he had to circle back with a heel raised to clip the next guy with his boot. It meant that the third man had enough time to raise his gun and demand something in a vicious tone of voice.  


The pirate was speaking French, so Scott really had little to no idea what he was saying. His tone alone was clear enough, and so Scott lifted both hands, one still wrapped around the edge of his shield, trying to look like he was complying.  


It was convincing enough that the pirate never saw Ennis floating to the deck behind him on the wings of his parachute, and definitely never heard the silenced pistol chirp as Ennis shot him.  


Scott grimaced, but he still looked up as Allison and the rest of the Wolf Squad landed. “Thanks.”  


“You really looked like you were in serious trouble there, Cap.” Ennis grinned, something appropriately wolfish about the expression as he released his parachute from his shoulders.  


“Definitely.” Allison added, having landed behind them with all the lightness of a cat. Scott had barely even been aware she was there. “He’d be lost without us.”  


Rolling his eyes, Scott reholstered his shield and settled his shoulders. “Okay, _okay_ , well, the _Lemurian Star_ is going to be lost if we don’t get this job done. We can banter when it’s over.”  


The team didn’t need a second reminder. They moved with the efficiency of predators as they peeled off for their separate objectives. Scott tried to feel even half as effective or efficient as he turned to pursue his own.  


Scott’s best guess indicated that Batroc was probably on the bridge of the ship, preparing to pilot it to some undisclosed pirate location. He wasn’t about to let that happen, especially not with innocent hostages still on the vessel. He loped across the deck as swiftly and silently as he could manage, covering the distance between the dropzone and the bridge at an Alpha’s speed. He’d just about gotten to the bridge and scaled the outside of it when Allison’s voice came in, hushed, over their secured comm. “Engine room secure.”  


In response, there was Ennis, equally hushed, “Hostages located. Engaging hostiles.”  


“I’ve got Batroc.” Scott told them, before swinging his shield free in order to use it to bash through the windows of the bridge.  


Unfortunately, shattering windows out with a vibranium shield wasn’t very _subtle_ , and Batroc was in motion by the first instant of impact. He fled out the back of the bridge, and Scott lurched himself into pursuit, an instinctive growl bubbling up in his throat.  


Batroc led him down through the corridors of the ship, trying to lose him in the tight hallways and switchbacks of the _Lemurian Star’s_ internal workings. Scott refused to be lost, focusing his senses through the constant noise and smells of a ship in operation to keep track of Batroc’s heartbeat, his scent, the sound of his footfalls on the catwalks. He was a literal wolf on the track of his prey, implacable and resolute.  


Eventually, it seemed that Batroc grew tired of running. He doubled back on himself, going from _flight_ to _fight_ in such a short amount of time that Scott was almost taken off-guard.  


_Almost_. Not _actually_.  


Batroc was fast and vicious, trying to use the narrow corridors of the _Lemurian Star_ to his advantage. The only problem for him was that Scott was faster and stronger. He couldn’t get his shield into place, but Scott didn’t _need_ to; no matter how rapid or precise Batroc’s strikes were, no matter how much power he put behind them--which was a lot--Scott was faster, stronger, able to parry and block and force Batroc backwards step by step.  


He walked them like that, in some tight choreography of desperate sparring, out from the inner hallways of the _Star_ and back into a broader, open space. As soon as it was possible, Scott unholstered his shield, using the circular momentum of that to whip it straight across of Batroc’s face.  


Like before, it wasn’t nearly as clean a knock-out as he had hoped for. Batroc saw the blow coming and tumbled backwards, barely getting clipped with the bottom edge of the shield on his way back. He came back up onto his feet with a hop, barely bleeding out of the corner of his mouth, and shook his head to clear it.  


“You could surrender now,” Scott suggested, his free hand clenching into a loose fist around his claws, “And you wouldn’t get hurt.”  


Batroc bit out a bitter laugh, his head shaking. “There is no _surrendering_ without _consequence_ to _S.H.I.E.L.D.”_  


Over the comm, Ennis’ voice informed Scott, “Hostages enroute to extraction point. Argent missed rendezvous. Batroc still unaccounted for.”  


“I’ll have him in a minute.” Scott replied, before tipping his head back at Batroc, free hand spreading briefly. “If you aren’t going to surrender, we might as well get this over with.”  


Batroc charged him, and Scott leaned in low, checking him with his shoulder and pitching the man up over him bodily. Batroc hit the deck hard, but popped up again, as if he didn’t feel the pain. This time, when he came at Scott low, Scott brought his knee up sharply, colliding with Batroc’s chin. The pirate pitched backwards dramatically, at which point Scott pivoted on one leg and kicked Batroc’s knee out.  


Somehow, even _that_ didn’t stop Batroc. He charged a third time, and Scott was determined this time would be the last. It was time to finish this fight. As Batroc closed on him, Scott leaned in and grasped him about the waist, like he was making a tackle in American football. Scott put the entirety of his weight and his Alpha strength into barrelling forward, reversing Bartoc’s momentum.  


They slammed into a nearby bulkhead with enough speed for Bartoc’s skull to bounce off of the metal. He passed into unconsciousness almost immediately.  


The door groaned around its hinges and then gave way before Scott could regain his balance, spilling him haphazardly into the room in a sprawl atop Bartoc’s limp frame.  


The room itself was full of banks of computer monitors and work stations. At one of those work stations was Black Widow, looking up from where she’d been bent over the keyboard, expression mildly surprised.

  
“...well. Okay. _You’re_ not supposed to be here.”


	35. Chapter 35

 

“ _I’m_ not supposed to be in here?” Scott was completely taken aback, almost frozen by finding Allison _here_ instead of where she was _supposed_ to be. “ _You’re_ not supposed to be in here! What are _you_ doing here?”  


Allison’s mouth pursed, and she turned to look back at what she was doing, fingers flying over the keys. “I’m making a backup.”  


Something slithered through the bottom of Scott’s gut, bitter and uncomfortable. “Ennis needed you! Didn’t you hear him?”  


“I heard him.” Allison replied, her tone just a little cagey. Her scent and heartbeat hadn’t flinched, but Scott had already learned that _the Black Widow_ didn’t give up the truth so easily, not even to a werewolf. “But this was more important.”  


A growl fought to claw its way out of Scott’s throat, difficult to swallow back. He took a step forward without being able to restrain himself, bristling as he entered Allison’s personal space. “There is _nothing_ more important than saving innocents. You could have jeopardized the entire extraction! People could have _died_!”  


Allison rolled her eyes, the gesture so exaggerated it seemed out of place in context. “Don’t be dramatic. Nobody died, did they? You and the Wolf Squad had that covered, extremely well. My mission was to retrieve vital intel. _That’s_ actually important too, Captain. _That_ might save lives, _too_ , Captain.”  


He wanted to argue this, but there wasn’t any time. From across the room, Batroc staggered back to his feet. He took one look at the pair of them and then turned to bolt back out of the bulkhead that he and Scott had destroyed on their way in.  


While Scott was still a little stunned from having found Allison on a _secret mission_ , Black Widow wasn’t so fazed. With a quietly murmured ‘scuse me’, she snapped her jumpdrive out of the console and then _vaulted_ the whole row of them, sleek and swift. She caught up with Batroc easily, before he got very far at all, and then leapt at his back, bringing up one fist to connect it with the base of his skull.  


Blue light discharged from her glove and Allison rode Batroc down to the deck as she tasered him back into unconsciousness.  


She legitimately flipped her hair over her shoulder as she turned to look back at Scott, still far too blithe for the situation. “See? Everything’s fine.”  


Scott didn’t have an answer for that short of curling his hands into fists and feeling his claws bite through the padding of his gloves.  


They didn’t talk on the way back to the extraction point, _nor_ on the long ride back to Triskelion. Scott was tired and wanted to sleep, but he couldn’t manage more than a few minutes at a time, snatched here and there on the course of the flight. He was otherwise far too tense, too _angry_ with having been played, to find any real rest whatsoever.  


That anger was still rattling around inside his chest when they finally made it back to Triskelion. Scott circumvented the usual debriefing procedure to instead storm Deaton’s office, without even pausing to change out of his uniform. The expression on Deaton’s face as he looked up at Scott’s entry wasn’t nearly surprised enough for Scott’s taste.  


“You couldn’t have _told_ me?” Scott demanded before the door had even closed behind him, knuckles tight in his fists.  


As always, Deaton was implacable, showing no real signs of agitation or regret. “I thought it was best that you remained focused on the hostage extraction.”  


Maybe it was that stoicism that really frustrated Scott. He shook his head, the gesture harsh and abrupt. “Which could have been completely compromised because I didn’t know what was going on! You can’t give me an asset that isn’t actually my asset, people _die_ when soldiers don’t do their jobs!”  


“Not everyone working for S.H.I.E.L.D. is a soldier, McCall. They’re not all like you.” Deaton replied, straightening from whatever he’d been doing over his desk. He started to move towards Scott, and ridiculously, for a second Scott thought maybe he was going to _attack_.  


“Maybe they _should_ be.” Scott spat back, as ridiculous as he knew the statement was. “I need to know I can trust people in the field with me. I can’t be watching my back against my allies _too_.”  


Deaton considered him for a long time. He seemed to come to some kind of conclusion, bowing his head briefly. He nodded to himself, and then made a gesture to indicate that Scott should follow him to the elevator. “I think it’s about time I showed you something.”  


There was still a strong sense of unease settled deep in Scott, but the promise of getting _something_ like some answers, some _information_ , was enough to keep him from refusing. Instead, he followed Deaton into the elevator, slouching against the glass wall that showed off an impressive view of Washington D.C.  


“Insight Deck.” Deaton told the elevator, promptly feeding it a voiceprinted override code when it objected that Scott didn’t have clearance for that area of the HQ.  


They descended in silence for a few minutes before Deaton began to speak again. “I know you value human life over everything. I know that’s why you signed up in the first place, to fight the Nazi Regime. I know that’s why you continue to fight. It’s why S.H.I.E.L.D. fights, too.”  


The elevator swept downwards as Deaton spoke, revealing a level of the Triskelion headquarters building that Scott had never seen before. It was massive, a hanger bay likely big enough to hold the Helicarrier that S.H.I.E.L.D. had used as a base of operations before New York. Inside of it were a hundred or more bustling S.H.I.E.L.D. agents and construction crews, engineers and techs and Scott-didn’t-know what else.  


There were also three smaller Helicarriers docked in bays, apparently awaiting launch.  


“This is what Project Insight is all about, Scott, saving lives. Those Helicarriers have repulsor engines on them designed and fitted by Derek Hale himself, running on his arc reactor technology. They’re entirely self-sufficient.” Deaton lead the way out of the elevator when it finally came to a rest, using one hand to gesture to the Helicarriers dominating the background of the room. “They can eliminate a thousand hostiles in a minute. They remain suborbital and can target anywhere on the globe in a matter of moments. They can locate, identify, and eliminate a terrorist by DNA via satellite uplink before he’s finished pouring his morning coffee.”  


A wash of cold air swept over Scott and dug its claws into the base of his spine. For a long time, he had no words to express just how _heinous_ these Helicarriers seemed to be. “This is...terrible.”  


“This is foresight, Captain. With technology like this, we can prevent a crisis before it even starts.”  


“No!” Scott found himself shouting, drawing eyes from the other people in the hangar bay. “I’ve seen this before, Deaton. I know exactly what it is when you summarily _execute_ people without a trial, or judge, or jury. This isn’t _freedom_ , this is _fear!_ It’s _tyranny!_ You can’t hold a loaded gun to the population of the entire planet and call yourself the _good guy_!”  


For the first time since Scott had known him, Deaton almost looked _sad_. He looked away from Scott to the Helicarriers behind them, expression distant for a long time. “Purity of purpose is a nice sentiment, Scott, but it’s not something that goes too far in a world like this one. Not if you want to actually make a difference.”  


His entire body bristling with anger, Scott leaned in close. He let his eyes flash red as he spoke, voice as intense as he could manage it without physically growling. “There’s such a thing as going too far. And this? This is way, _way_ beyond it.”  


There was nothing else for him to say to that. The urge to destroy the entire level of Triskelion burned in every inch of Scott’s body, sung along his limbs. He needed to get _out_ before _he_ did something he’d regret, too.  


Nobody tried to stop him as he stormed his way back to the elevator to make his escape.

  
  



	36. Chapter 36

The problem with being so completely out of place and time, as Scott was, was that he had nowhere to run to when he needed something familiar. That had been the entire _point_ of moving to Washington D.C., to leave behind the phantoms of his old life, but now all he wanted was those shadows to embrace him and shelter him from the harshness of what the world had become.  


There was no going back in time, but living so close to the Smithsonian, Scott could come closer than most people.  


The Captain America exhibit had been a permanent fixture of the Museum of American History since before Scott had been thawed. He had never visited it, feeling the whole thing was a little too self-aggrandizing. He’d never been comfortable with the adulation, or with the legend that had grown up around him while he’d ‘slept’. Now, however, seemed the time to actually visit it, because it was the only chance he had to see faces he’d missed for longer than he even knew how to quantify.  


He went back to his apartment long enough to change out of his uniform and instead put on a baseball cap that he could pull down over his face in a hasty attempt to hide his identity. The last thing he wanted was to be recognized at his own exhibit and treated like he was _part_ of the exhibit.  


As it turned out, nobody noticed him. As long as Scott kept his head down and kept to the back of the small crowds that moved through the museum, he wasn’t bothered by anyone at all. Instead, he found himself bothered by the narration of his own life, the voice-over which seemed to have been chosen for its ability to sensationalize even the smallest detail. Never before had his former asthma been portrayed as something he _heroically endured_. It all seemed to be making a big deal about nothing at all.  


There was a tiny part of the exhibit dedicated to Stiles, which took Scott off-guard enough it felt like someone had punched him in his chest. It wasn’t nearly big enough to explain to anyone visiting how much space Stiles had taken up in his life, but Scott realized as he watched the old, archival footage and paced slowly by all of the photos that he’d needed to _see_ Stiles, to hear the familiar rasp of his voice. Scott stood by that part of the exhibit for the better part of an hour, watching the children who skipped past it entirely with a sad frown, biting back something more like a tearful smile every time the recording tripped clumsily over the tangle of letters that was Stiles’ given name.  


By the time he left the museum, Scott was still full of emotions, but none of them were that burning _rage_ any more. They were softer, more pliable, easier to fall into. That made them dangerous in a much different way, and for once Scott wasn’t much interested in sinking into the morass of that quicksand.  


He jogged three laps around the Reflecting Pool before Scott determined that wasn’t doing anything to settle his nerves. He’d never felt so isolated in his entire life. He had no one to talk to, no one who understood, no place he could go where he wasn’t _Captain America_ , always a soldier no matter whether or not he wore the uniform. He didn’t even know if he could trust the people he was taking orders from, or if he was really fighting the fight he _thought_ he was fighting.  


Scott ended up leaning over in front of the Lincoln Memorial, hands on his knees, eyes closed, breathing heavily as if that had anything to do with how he’d been running. The whole length of the Reflecting Pool and the Mall beyond it felt like it was going to turn vertical and crush him. It seemed so out of nowhere, in between the sounds of his noisy breaths, that Scott thought of Mason, who usually ran this path along with him, and how Mason had pointed out he worked at the VA. It was such a long shot, and it was likely Scott was just going to end up being unwelcome, interrupting Mason at work, but it really was the only shot he had at all.  


His breath felt firmly resettled in his lungs when he straightened up to make his way back to his motorcycle.  


As it turned out, Mason wasn’t difficult to find. Scott was already familiar with his scent from morning runs, and as soon as he entered the front area of the VA building, he caught onto it. He wandered the halls for only a few minutes before he found Mason in one of the rooms on the first floor, accompanied with a handful of other people.  


Scott didn’t interrupt, but it was almost impossible for him to avoid _eavesdropping_. Luckily, overhearing their conversation only lead Scott to realize that it was a group therapy session for veterans. Mason was helping them work through their different stages of PTSD.  


Eventually, the meeting wrapped up, and the others left the room, barely glancing to Scott as they did. Mason, however, seemed to notice him as soon as he was in the threshold of the door, eyebrows lifted in surprise. “Hey! I guess you’re done with that mission?”  


“Yeah.” Scott confirmed, pushing off of the wall he’d been leaning against with his shoulders. He felt like maybe they should be walking, _moving_ somehow, but he really had nowhere to go or to lead Mason to. “All objectives completed.”  


“You don’t look exactly like you’re thrilled about that.” Mason caught on to Scott’s unease so immediately, Scott was left wondering for half a second if Mason was a werewolf and Scott just somehow hadn’t smelled it.  


He decided just as quickly that it wasn’t possible for that to be the case, and Mason was probably just good at his job. The smile Scott gave him in response was crooked and a little sad, like he’d learned how to smile that way from someone else. “You ever have a time, while you were deployed, that in the middle of a mission you suddenly didn’t really know why you were there?”  


Mason’s face was all compassion and concern. “Do you mean in a literal sense, or more in a moral sense?”  


“The second.” Scott clarified, tucking his chin and his eyes. “Like maybe you suddenly realized you didn’t know if you were doing the right thing, or even the best thing you _could_ have been doing in that moment? Where you started wondering if all of it was worth it?”  


The other man drew in a sharp breath, and then Mason was silent for a long time. It was clear that he wasn’t ignoring Scott, but rather weighing the mass of his words and considering his own response carefully. Scott appreciated that.  


“I think so.” Mason decided after that long consideration, bringing his eyes up to meet Scott’s. “After Riley. He was my wingman. We were--we were flying a standard rescue, we weren’t expecting heavy resistance. But there was some bootheel on the ground with an RPG, and he took Riley out like he was playing Duck Hunt. There wasn’t anything I could do about it, except finish the mission. After that...it seemed really hard to justify trying to go save these men who had been put in dangerous situations for what seemed like nothing, when I couldn’t even protect my right hand, you know?”  


Scott closed his eyes, trying to chase away the images of Stiles’ pale, panic-stricken face as he fell off the side of a train, long ago. “...yeah. I know. I know that...really well.”  


More gently, Mason continued, “You ever consider getting out? Every soldier has to retire sometime.”  


“I don’t think I’d know what to _do_ with myself, if I wasn’t doing it.” Scott admitted with a sigh that felt like it came up from the very pit of his stomach. “It’s all I know how to do. All of my friends and the things I used to like to do are dead.”  


“ _Maybe_ that means it’s time for new friends and new hobbies. I mean, I get it. I _get_ it. It hurts, and you don’t want to leave your buddies behind in the past when they can’t come into the future with you, but…” Mason shrugged, then, offering his wisdom up on his palms like he didn’t mind either way if Scott took it. “...no matter how much you look backwards, the future’s still coming, and if your friends were anything like mine, they wouldn’t want you to walk ass-first into something you could have been prepared for.”  


The words stirred something in Scott’s chest, but he couldn’t quite tell what it was. He offered Mason an anemic smile, trying not to look like he felt, like there were lead weights tied to his wrists and dragging him down. “Thanks, Mason. I, uh. I’d better--”  


He _wanted_ to say that he needed to go, but it was kind of a lie. Scott didn’t have anywhere else to be, only the sense that maybe, wherever it was, he needed to be alone.  


Mason seemed to pick up on _that_ , too. His smile was kind, his words without judgement. “Hey, no problem. Feel free to drop by any time, man. Maybe next time we can talk more than like ten minutes. If you wanna do drinks, I’d be happy to pay for the first round.”  


Scott’s smile grew more genuine, if only for a moment. “Thank you, again. I mean it.”  


After that, he took his leave, thoughts ricocheting off of the inside of his skull, all jumbled up with old memories and ghost voices. Scott took the long way back to his apartment and still felt like he got there pathetically quickly, with nothing to distract him or sidetrack him along the way.

  
He didn’t even bother to take his boots off before allowing himself collapse face-first onto his bed and into a fitful sleep.


	37. Chapter 37

They were on a boat off the shore of France, and it was raining. They were supposed to be regrouping before they were sent out on another mission, and most of the Howling Commandos were below decks, resting up before their deployment. Stiles wasn’t resting, though, and that meant Scott wasn’t resting, either. Instead, they were standing on deck in dubious shelter, occasionally being pelted by the cold rain or the colder ocean spray.  


They were already going to have to change before they left for the mission; Scott’s shirt was half-soaked, the arm he hadn’t been able to shelter against the ship’s cabin wall wet past his skin. Stiles looked like he wanted to be leaning on the railing and looking out over the water, but the rain and the rough seas made that impossible. There was something strangely hungry about the way he looked out towards the horizon, something about the lighting that emphasized his cheekbones and the hollows of his eyes in the worst way.  


Everything vibrated at the wrong frequency, but Scott ignored it in order to study the side of Stiles’ face, the rain-slick surface of his skin and every individual mole that peppered it. He saw it less and less often, after all, and Scott never knew exactly when the next time he saw it would be, never knew if these moles were _right_ , or in the right places. He never tried to rattle that thought too hard, or grip too firmly to his knowledge that this, like so many other things he yearned for these days, was a dream. He was too afraid if he shook it, it would fall apart.  


Still, eventually he couldn’t stand just _standing_ and doing nothing. He made a soft sound of warning before asking Stiles, after who-knows-how-long of silence, “You ever think this was a mistake?”  


Stiles half-laughed, in the tired, bitter way he’d seemed to have adopted most frequently after the war started. “What, standing out here on deck? Probably, but we’re more or less committed now, it’s not like we could get much _wetter_.”  


“You know what I mean, Stiles.”  


With a long sigh, Stiles straightened a little and turned to look at Scott more fully. The light still insisted on playing tricks with his face, blurring too many of his features, darkening his eye sockets until the amber of his irises seemed to shine out from them. “I mean, I don’t think it’s _fun_. None of it’s been _comfortable_. But a mistake? No. I don’t think it was a mistake.”  


It was Scott’s turn to look out over the featureless waves. “How can you be so sure? We just go where we’re put and we do what we’re told, like little wind-up toys. Don’t you ever worry that maybe the people holding the keys don’t have the best of intentions?”  


“Maybe.” Stiles admitted quietly. Scott could feel his eyes still on him, the only points of warmth in an otherwise cold and dismal landscape. “But what good is worrying about that gonna do? Whatever their ulterior motives are, or _whatever_ , they’re almost _certainly_ not going to be as bad as the _Nazis_. It isn’t like they’ve asked _us_ to have anything to do with herding up all the Japanese-Americans back home.”  


“Yeah, but they’re still _doing_ it.” Scott frowned, eyes dropping from the ocean to his fingers.  


“We can only fight one front at a time, Scotty. We fix this first, then we can go home and straighten that out, too.”  


He didn’t like that answer. It didn’t feel like _enough_. He didn’t like the fact that he felt like every day the bar slipped a little lower, everything was just a _little_ more permissible, like one day they’d find themselves at a place where _anything_ was permissible. “It’s just that there has to be a _line_ somewhere, Stiles. There has to be such a thing as going too far.”  


Stiles’ head bobbed in agreement. He lifted one hand to grip at Scott’s dry shoulder, and something jolted through Scott from the contact inwards, crossing his heart like lightning. “Sure. Of course there is. But I have to believe that you and me, we’ll _know_ that line when we see it, and we won’t go over it. They ask us to cross it, and that’s the day we walk away. Okay?”  


“Is that a promise, Stilinski?” Scott was trying for casual, a familiar joke, but like happened too-often these days, it came out intense, like it was critically tied into the fabric of Scott’s being.  


Stiles squeezed at Scott’s shoulder, briefly. “Of course it’s a promise, buddy. The minute you’re out, I’m going with you. Didn’t I tell you before? I’m with you until the end of the line.”  


Scott closed his eyes against a swell of emotion. He knew that particular promise to be worthless, in some ways. He’s sure Stiles _meant_ it, even within the context of the memory. It wasn’t Stiles’ fault that his line had been so carefully overlaid onto Scott’s that neither of them had seen how much shorter Stiles’ line had actually been.  


“I miss you, Stiles.” Scott found himself saying, before he could stop it.  


The hand on his shoulder lifted. Everything seemed to be covered in a thin, wet veil, sounds and scents muted and far away. Even the colors, when Scott opened his eyes, were washed out and grayscale. Everything except Stiles’ own eyes.  


Those were as bright as they’d ever been, like lamplights in a dark landscape. “I know you do.”  


“I think about it, sometimes. Too much. If I’d only been faster, if I’d been paying more attention, if--if I’d just _done_ more, maybe you’d--” Scott’s throat started to close up around the emotion, scraping against its sharp edges.  


“There wasn’t anything you could have done that you didn’t do, Scotty. You _know_ that. You’ve got to let yourself _believe_ it. What happened to me wasn’t your fault.” Stiles’ voice was so quiet, now, almost distant, like it was floating to Scott on some distant breeze.  


“It feels like it. It _still_ feels like it was my fault, Stiles. Every time I close my eyes and see you falling, any time I get up too high and think I see you vanishing into the abyss, it _feels_ like I did it to you.” He couldn’t stop himself from talking, now, the words tumbling out of him with the same finality that Stiles had fallen with. “And I...I just...I look around at everything that’s changed, how _different_ the world is around me, and I think...why not? I mean, why _couldn’t_ somebody come back from the dead? We’ve done almost everything else, at this point. Couldn’t they bring you back? I’d--”  


Something ugly entered Stiles’ voice when he laughed, this time. For no apparent reason, he lifted the hand that had been resting on Scott’s shoulder, and pressed its fingertips to Scott’s lips. His skin was so cold, and Scott’s mouth stilled beneath it.  


“Shh, shh, Scotty, no. No, don’t say that. Don’t make wishes when you don’t know what you’re wishing for. They might come _true_.” Stiles said it like it was a _threat_ , like having him back wasn’t, somehow, the thing Scott had wanted with his very _essence_ from the instant Stiles was taken from him.  


Cold tears stung at Scott’s cheeks, but he opened his mouth just a little, trying to let the heat of his breath curl around Stiles’ fingers and warm them up. “Stiles, I would give up _everything_. I would give up _anything_. For that to come true.”

  
  



	38. Chapter 38

Scott woke up suddenly to the sound of someone else’s heartbeat in his apartment.  


For a fraction of an instant, just the space of one dying half-born hope, he thought it was Stiles. Reality caught up with him faster than he appreciated, however, and he realized abruptly that, _no_ , while that heartbeat definitely _wasn’t_ Stiles’, he knew exactly whose it was.  


Just like he knew exactly what that iron-laced scent was surrounding it.  


Scott rolled off of his bed and onto his feet, all of his senses on high alert. Despite the fact that there was an _intruder_ in his _house_ , there was something else, something he couldn’t pinpoint, like screaming at the very edge of his hearing. All of the hair on his body was standing on end, making him feel nervous, jumpy, but he couldn’t afford to spend any attention trying to figure out what or why that feeling was. He had to deal with the problem immediately in front of him.  


The problem being, namely, Director Alan Deaton, sitting in one of the chairs in Scott’s living room, reeking of blood.  


In the dim light, Scott could see him as he inched into the living room, shield raised. Deaton looked, frankly, like _hell_. There were many injuries on his face, blood soaking into his shirt, one arm and the opposite leg held off from his body like they were causing Deaton pain, like _maybe_ he couldn’t even move them.  


Before Scott could say anything, Deaton moved one hand, careful to keep what was in it hidden from the windows. It was his phone, which read in large, high contrast text, _theyre listening_.  


What Deaton said with his _mouth_ was, “Sorry. I didn’t have anyone else to turn to. I know I should have knocked.”  


“I didn’t even know you had a key.” Scott said, trying not to sound so _stunned_. His eyes were fixated on the phone, despite how distracting and urgent the scent of blood was becoming.  


“Well, I like to keep my lines of communications as open as possible.” _shield compromised_ , Deaton reported via his phone next. It was difficult to see his expression in the dark, but Scott thought maybe he caught hints of fear in it, in his scent beneath the injuries.  


Scott’s blood felt like it was made of ice. It was like all of his worst fears were suddenly coming to light, becoming _reality_. The agency he’d been working for had the tools to hold the entire world hostage, and now he was finding out there were those inside of it who were going to _do_ just _that_. “Who _else_ has a key to my apartment?”  


Deaton knew the question for what it really was, a question of who knew about the breach in security, and he shook his head just a little bit. “Just you and me.”  


The phone message changed once again. _dont trust anybody_.  


Immediately, Scott wondered if that meant Deaton, too. He had no means to _ask_ that, and, as it turned out, no _chance_.  


_No chance_ mostly because Deaton stood from the chair to cross the space to Scott, and when he did, a trio of tightly clustered gunshots rang out.  


The window of the apartment shattered, and Deaton’s chest blossomed with three new spots of red.  


Reflex had Scott dropping to the ground, out of line of sight from the window. He immediately started to crawl to Deaton’s side, horror roiling in the base of his throat. Deaton was already rasping through breaths, blood in his mouth. He was clutching something in his hand that _wasn’t_ his phone, trying desperately to get it into Scott’s hand.  


It was a USB jump drive. Scott put it into a pocket and then immediately started trying to drag Deaton out into the entryway of his apartment.  


Scott’s across-the-hall neighbor immediately burst in through the front door, having clearly kicked it down. He snarled protectively as she entered, fangs already dropping, but she was holding a gun in one hand and identification bearing the S.H.I.E.L.D. insignia in the other. “Agent 13, S.H.I.E.L.D. Special Service. I’ve been stationed here to keep an eye on you--”  


She paused mid-sentence, and Scott wasn’t sure if it was at the sight of Deaton, or at his snarl, “On _whose_ authority?!”  


“His.” Agent 13 answered, eyes locked on Deaton.  


Scott wanted to demand more of an explanation, but something in his peripheral vision caught his attention through the window instead. It was the smallest glint of metal, but it was _there_ , reflecting in the darkness from the building across the way, and instantly Scott knew what it was.  


The sniper.  


He turned towards Agent 13 to give her the briefest of instructions. “Call an ambulance. I’m after the shooter.”  


Scott didn’t give her a chance to respond or defy him. Instead, Scott paused long enough to grab his shield and then launched himself out of the window.  


He hit the side of the other building with his claws out and skidded a couple of inches downwards before he could halt his momentum. Scott growled with frustration and put all of his strength into lunging upwards, scaling the building at an inhuman speed, in an inhuman way. He didn’t care at all if he was seen, since his cover and the secrecy of his apartment had clearly already been blown. All he cared about was closing in on his quarry.  


Scott cleared the wall onto the top of the building and was immediately hit with a terrible mishmash of information. It was like diving headfirst into a TV full of static; simultaneously, his ears and nose kept telling him that there was _nothing here_ , that there was _something everywhere_ and also that that _something_ was something he’d encountered before. It pressed on him with an abrupt intensity, made his chest feel tight like he was about to have an asthma attack. His head filled with white noise, like too many distant voices screaming all at the same time, in different keys.  


Still, despite whatever lies his other senses were telling him, Scott could still _see_ just fine. About halfway across the roof from him was a man, sprinting at a speed that already told Scott that this man wasn’t entirely human.  


He was maybe around six feet tall, and dressed in dark clothing except for his left arm, which seemed to be covered in some kind of metal sleeve. Scott couldn’t see any of his skin, but he could tell that his hair was dark and long enough to touch his collar, although it was in constant chaos as the man ran. With his other senses in a riot, Scott couldn’t narrow in on even the sound of the other man’s footsteps, much less his scent or his heartbeat.  


That didn’t matter.  


A quarter of the way across the rooftop, Scott realized he wasn’t going to catch this guy. He allowed himself a half-swallowed roar of frustration and lifted his shield, hopping into a jump so that he could spin around himself and use his weight to enhance his momentum in flinging the thing so hard it sang.  


What happened next shouldn’t have been _possible_.  


The sniper just _stopped running_. He slid a step backwards and pivoted on his heel, every motion the kind of motion made by a trained, experienced predator. He’d barely even turned to look at Scott when that metallic left arm shot up, whirring with barely-audible servos.  


He caught Scott’s shield.  


Then, he threw the shield back.  


It came in on its side, moving fast, and it was all Scott could do to catch it. The edge bit into his palms and the scent of his own blood added itself to the confusing cacophony of smells around him.  


Scott looked up just long enough to see the sniper still pivoted towards him, staring. His face was covered from the nose down with a black neoprene mask. It had the shape of a snarling wolf’s muzzle embossed on it. The sniper’s eyes had been surrounded by black greasepaint that filled in the entire sockets, obscuring what was left of his features. All that Scott could tell was that the man was white.  


A heartbeat passed, no more. Then the sniper’s form seemed to ripple around the edges, and he simply, literally, vanished.

  
  



	39. Chapter 39

Scott scrambled back down from the roof and made his way back to his own apartment. The whole thing was compromised, and it wasn’t like he exactly had a lot of personal belongings he cared much about, but he went back anyway, like maybe there was something else he should be taking with him.  


There wasn’t. He had his shield on his back and the USB drive that Deaton had given him heavy in his pocket. Everything else in the apartment was superfluous at best.  


So he left, following the hazy scent of Deaton’s blood on his motorcycle until he ended up at the right hospital.  


He didn’t have any trouble getting lead to the observation room outside of where the doctors were frantically operating on Deaton. Allison was already there, her body language tense and stand-offish. She had both arms crossed over her middle, and although her heartbeat was as calm and resolute as it ever was, her scent betrayed hints of her anxiety.  


She looked up at Scott as he entered, and then just past him and over his shoulder. Scott turned to realize that Agent Romero was just behind him. She seemed grim, although her face was a little flushed, and Scott decided she must have flown down from New York in one of the quinjets. He must have spent more time on that roof and lingering in his apartment than he’d meant to.  


He moved into the room to give Hayden enough space to stand at the windows, too. Then Scott turned just fractionally to Allison, voice soft. “How’s he doing?”  


“Not sure.” She responded, and it occurred to Scott that this might have been the first time he’d seen Allison where he thought she _meant_ she didn’t know what was going on, where it wasn’t just a ruse for one of her long cons. “He was pretty badly hurt. At least three slugs in him. He’s lost a lot of blood. They’re doing what they can.”  


“The bullets were of French make.” Hayden volunteered, tangentially, her eyes still on the medical drama playing out on the other side of the glass. “No rifling. Very few unique features, if any. They don’t match anything in our database. They might as well be untraceable.”  


Allison frowned. She looked down, briefly, and then up to Scott, studying his face as she asked, “What about the shooter?”  


Scott shook his head. “I couldn’t catch him. He was fast. _Really_ fast. Like, as fast as I am fast. He’s white. Male. I couldn’t get a scent on him at all, it was like something was scrambling my noise. It looked like his left arm was made of metal. _And_ , he just _vanished_. As in, I was looking right at him, and he disappeared.”  


Allison _paled_. Her eyes widened, like what Scott had said _meant_ something to her. He wanted to ask, suddenly desperately wanted to know what _she_ knew, but in that precise moment, the world exploded into sound.  


It took Scott a moment to realize it was all coming from the other side of the glass. The medical team was practically crawling over Deaton, yelling at each other with terse, tense voices about _blood pressure_ and _tachycardia_ and _defibrillators_.  


Scott felt like he was far, far away as he watched them shock Deaton’s body once, twice, three times with increasingly aggressive levels of electricity. He felt like he was maybe on another world entirely when the doctors took a step back and announced like the toll of some terrible bell, “Calling it. Time of death, 1:03 AM.”  


Next to him, Hayden started to shake, so minutely. Her voice rasped out, somehow both too-quiet and too-loud in the observation room. “ _No_.”  


She pulled back from the window, turning to go speak with the medical team about their next step. Every fall of her feet was louder and heavier than the last.  


Once she was out of the room, Allison turned towards him again. She pulled her white-knuckled hands off of the frame of the window, and instead put them on Scott’s forearms, just below his elbows. She used them to guide him away from the window, away from the door that Hayden had left through, into as private a corner of the room as they could find. “Why was Deaton in your apartment?”  


There was an intensity in Allison’s question and her _gaze_ that bordered on feral. It took Scott off-guard for an instant, made him take a proverbial step back and really study her face. All he could remember was Deaton’s last message to him, hastily written on his cellphone. _Don’t trust anybody_. “I--I don’t know--”  


He didn’t get any further into that sentence before Ennis entered the room, and Scott’s sentence died in his throat.  


Ennis didn’t hesitate, or pause to let Scott and Allison finish their conversation. He just walked straight up to Scott and announced, “They’re asking for you at S.H.I.E.L.D. HQ.”  


“Who’s asking for me?” Scott rarely, if ever, had taken orders from anyone but Deaton, directly. The idea that _right now_ , anyone could possibly be calling for him, was _baffling_.  


Something in Ennis’ expression darkened, and he spoke as if Scott’s question was an idiotic one, as if it could have no other answer. “S.H.I.E.L.D. Command.”  


Of course. There wasn’t going to be an answer beyond that. There wasn’t going to be an explanation. There was only going to be the corrupted arm of S.H.I.E.L.D. trying to tighten up on his leash.  


Scott smiled pleasantly, despite the taste of ash in his mouth. “Okay. I’ll get there soon.”  


“They want you there _now_.” Ennis pushed, his voice growing hard.  


But Scott was not about to be bullied, even by a comrade-in-arms. His smile dropped, and so did his chin, reinforcing his Alpha status to Ennis. He could see the reaction in the Beta, as he dropped his shoulders and eyeline just faintly. “I said, I’ll be there soon.”  


“Understood.” Ennis grumbled, and then he turned to go without much more than the barest nod of acknowledgement.  


“You’re a terrible liar.” Allison said, as soon as Ennis had left the room. She didn’t explain anything any further. She just left, in the opposite direction as Ennis. The room suddenly seemed so quiet and empty, like something had fallen out of the world.  


He wasn’t going to be able to put off returning to Triskelion forever. When he did, Scott was sure they were going to find the jump drive that Deaton had given him, and whatever chance he had at finding the truth would be gone with it. He put his head down, reaching into both pocket, and wrapped his fingers around the USB drive carefully.  


Scott took a deep breath in, looking around the observation room for anything, _anything_ he thought he could use to get himself out of this predicament before he left with Ennis.  


When his eyes fell on the old, seemingly oft-neglected vending machine in the corner, a single flutter of hope started to rise in his chest. He shuffled over to it, using his body to block what he was doing as he pried one of the side panels open with his claws. It was more simple than it should have been to slide the USB drive into the load it in the back of one of the slots, behind an unappetizing row of sugar free gum. When he snapped the panel back in place, it was all but impossible to see the drive was there, even _knowing_ it was there.  


It was as good as he was going to get, right now. He had to just hope it was enough.

  
With a sigh and a straightening of his shoulders, Scott turned to follow Ennis back into the bastion of what might now be his enemy.


	40. Chapter 40

The ride back to Triskelion was more tense than anything Scott had experienced before, somehow more tense even than flying over combat zones in a trundling World War II plane, waiting for the next dropzone where he and Stiles would be deployed. Scott felt like both he and Ennis knew they were dogs at the end of their chains, and the closer they got to the Headquarters, the more Scott worried what would happen when those chains were jerked too hard.  


They parted ways immediately upon arrival, after Ennis told him that he was expected on the 32nd floor by the overseeing Commander for the Wolf Squad, Alexander Deucalion.  


Scott had never met Deucalion face to face, but he’d heard enough about him to come to a few conclusions. Like most of the Wolf Squad, Deucalion was also a werewolf. Unlike the Squad, _he_ was an Alpha. Specifically, he was _their_ Alpha, and although Scott didn’t know how he’d come by that power, he had a suspicion it wasn’t exactly the same was Scott had gotten _his_.  


The 32nd floor of Triskelion headquarters was brightly lit, dominated by huge glass windows that looked out over the D.C. area. Scott wanted to say that it looked open and welcoming, but that wasn’t really it. It was more _sterilized_ , like everything had been carefully scrubbed to remove any semblance of human impact. It made the hair on Scott’s arms and the back of his neck stand up, but he couldn’t afford to show any indication that he was uncomfortable.  


So instead, he strode confidently off of the elevator into Deucalion’s office space, head held high.  


Even at a glance, even seated, Deucalion had a certain level of imperiousness that Scott had never really achieved with his own Alpha spark, much less _strived_ for. He moved like he expected the rest of the world to pivot around him for his own needs, every inch an obvious wolf from head to toe. Scott could tell from the very start that when Deucalion grinned and stretched a hand out towards Scott, that what he was _really_ doing was making sure to show his teeth.  


Scott took his hand and shook it anyway, determined to do everything he could to keep their conversation on the human level. He refused to let the wolves be in control. “Mr. Deucalion. It’s good to finally meet you.”  


“Likewise, Captain.” Deucalion responded with the faintest of nods. He seemed to be waiting for Scott to blink or break eye contact first. “I’ve heard a lot about your exploits. It’s a shame about Deaton, he was a good man.”  


Something about the comment set Scott off, like it was the bait waiting in the middle of a trap, reeking of poison. Scott was absolutely unwilling to put his teeth into it. “...did you know him well?”  


Deucalion watched Scott’s face with an intense scrutiny as he pulled his hand back, only to translate it to a gesture inviting Scott to sit down in any of the chairs scattered around his office. “Alan was security detail for S.H.I.E.L.D. when I was with the American Embassy in Bogota. Rebels attacked, and Alan was the only reason I and my family got out safely. We were very close. I think what the _real_ question is, how close to him were _you_?”  


Scott did not sit. “I’m sorry?”  


“You and Director Deaton. How close were you? Or were my reports that he was shot in your apartment inaccurate?” Deucalion still hadn’t moved his eyes off of Scott’s face, his weight on the balls of his feet like he thought he was going to have to lunge into action at any moment.  


Everything about it made Scott feel like he should be protecting his throat. “That is where he was shot, but I don’t know why he was there, or how the shooter knew he was there. He broke into the apartment while I was asleep, and I hadn’t been awake very long before he was shot.”  


Deucalion made a soft, thoughtful noise, some of the intensity in his gaze abating. “Hm. You know, we have Batroc in custody, don’t you?”  


It seemed like such a change in conversation, so _completely random_ , that it almost knocked Scott off of his proverbial feet. “Yes, of course. I was there when Black Widow knocked him unconscious. I was there when we brought him in.”  


“Well, he woke up.” Deucalion explained, laconic, blinking too-slowly. “And we’ve been questioning him. It turns out, he was _hired_ to assault the _Lemurian Star_ and paid in advance. It was never about ransoming hostages.”  


Scott’s eyes narrowed briefly, his mouth twisting around a vague, sour flavor that he couldn’t define. “So … if that wasn’t the point, what _was_? Were they trying to steal information?”  


Deucalion shook his head a little. “ _Somebody_ was certainly looking to get their hands on the files on the platform. I’m not saying it was necessarily Batroc.”  


A growl threatened to bubble out of Scott’s throat, but he swallowed it back, refusing to give Deucalion the satisfaction. “And...what? You’re saying you think that was Allison? Deaton? _Me_?”  


“I’m saying I don’t have enough information to speculate.” Deucalion leaned forward just a little, perilously close to entering Scott’s space. “Which is why I need to know exactly _why_ Deaton was in your apartment, and what he told you.”  


Every instinct Scott had told him that he couldn’t trust Deucalion. He focused on keeping his breathing and his heartbeat as even as possible as he spoke, “I don’t know, and he didn’t tell me anything. It all happened too fast.”  


“You can’t even tell me anything about the shooter?”  


Scott shook his head, the gesture as curt as he could make it. “No. I’m sorry. It was dark, even for my eyes, and he moved too quickly. I don’t have anything for you. Excuse me.”  


Turning on his heel, Scott started to make his way back to the elevator. It wasn’t very far, and he was determined to get out of the office before this weird sparring match of wills turned into something worse. He was almost all the way there when Deucalion spoke again.  


“I’m going to get to the bottom of this, Captain.” Deucalion’s voice was heavy, less like lead and more like steel, ready to be turned and used to attack at a moment’s notice. “I’m going to find out exactly what happened, and who’s responsible.”

  
Scott didn’t turn around. He threw his response over his shoulder as he stepped onto the elevator. “I hope you do.”


	41. Chapter 41

Two floors down from Deucalion’s office, the elevator stopped to let more people on. It was Ennis, along with part of his squad, headed for forensics. Ennis kept glancing at Scott like he wanted to say something, but kept second-guessing himself before he could actually vocalize any of it.  


Four floors down from Deucalion’s office, the elevator stopped again, and a few more members of the Wolf Squad entered. Like Ennis, they acknowledged him, but none of them seemed to want to look Scott square in the face, much less in the eyes.  


Scott knew something was wrong.  


The elevator was filled with tension, the other wolves cracking their knuckles or letting their fingers stray to weapons on their belts. When the elevator stopped at _another_ floor and filled the elevator to capacity with nervous, unhappy-smelling members of the Wolf Squad, it became obvious exactly what was about to happen.  


He could smell their sweat, their anticipation. He could smell that some of them were eager and that some were reluctant, but that all of them were going to follow the orders that must have come from their Alpha.  


The Alpha whose office he had just walked out of. The Alpha who _must_ have picked up on the fact that Scott was hiding something.  


Well, Allison _had_ just told him he was a terrible liar.  


Two or three more floors passed, before Scott decided he wasn’t going to stand around, surrounded, and wait for it to happen. He let his claws slip free of their beds, hidden by the way his fingers curled back against his palm, and said in the softest, calmest voice he could muster. “I just want you guys to know, you don’t _have_ to do this. If anyone wants to get out, I won’t think less of you.”  


The man directly in front of Scott turned, his eyes flaring beta blue, and Scott knew that none of them were going to leave the easy way.  


The Wolf Squad got its name because it was a _pack_ , a team of _werewolves_ who had been extensively trained to enhance their instincts and work as a group. They moved almost as one as they turned on Scott in the cramped space of the elevator.  


One of the men took his shield from its holster on his back, only to immediately toss it into the corner of the elevator. He and two of the men on Scott’s side tried to grapple with Scott’s right arm, while three more men tugged at his left. Two more men produced heavy metal cuffs from their pockets, which hummed with powerful magnetics as they activated. Ennis stood directly in front of Scott as he struggled with the _eight_ other men trying to hold him down, an electric baton in one hand. With the other hand, Ennis slammed the emergency stop button, and the elevator immediately stopped moving.  


Scott could tell that the men with the cuffs had the intention to use them on Scott. The magnetics would pin to the frame of the elevator and trap Scott in place, making it impossible to defend himself. If he let them do that, on top of having taken his shield, it would all be over.  


All of their focus was on restraining his hands. No one was looking at his feet.  


He lashed out with his right foot, kicking the knee of the nearest guy sideways with a sickening crunch. The beta went down with a cry of pain. The loss of his strength was enough to give Scott an advantage. He lurched forward, throwing his weight behind freeing his arm, and the men clinging to him fell back half a pace, stumbling against their allies. More importantly, the cuff which had been so perilously close to connecting with the metal elevator frame was knocked free of his wrist. It whipped across the elevator and sealed itself to the opposite wall with a dull clank.  


Scott lashed out with his claws at the next man, jabbing them stiffly into his throat. The beta gurgled and went down clutching at his new wound. Someone else came in against his left side and Scott slammed his elbow upwards into the guy’s nose, propelling him backward into the elevator wall.  


Another beta, from the right again, this time only to catch Scott’s foot in the center of his chest. He still couldn’t maneuver as much as he would have liked and hadn’t gotten free of the hold of the man behind him. He was trying to lock Scott into a pain suppression hold, but he didn’t seem to understand that Scott could endure a _lot_ of pain when he had to.  


He managed to drive off two more of the betas with short, quick punches before he finally had the time to deal with the man behind him. Scott reached up and dug his claws into the guy’s forearm and bicep. The man gave a low near-scream of pain, and Scott took half a step forward, bowing down into a crouch as he went. Between his momentum, his strength, and the distraction of the pain from his claws, Scott managed to flip the big guy over his head and onto the floor of the elevator.  


Unfortunately, that meant _Scott_ was distracted enough that Ennis could come sliding in out of seemingly nowhere to clamp his right arm to the wall with one of the magnetic cuffs.  


The next thing Ennis tried to do was lay into Scott with the electric baton. He parried the first strike with his forearm, but the second one connected with his back.  


Electricity jolted through his body, riding on a wave of agony. It disrupted his system, made it harder to access his strength, his healing, his wolf shift. He could feel his claws start to slide back into his hands.  


But Scott couldn’t afford to just give up. He had no idea what S.H.I.E.L.D. planned to do with him once they had him in custody, but given how quickly and violently they’d turned on him with the slightest order, he could trust in exactly one thing.  


He couldn’t _let_ them take him in.  


So he bit down until he could feel his fangs drop again. He forced himself to bull right through the electric current, and brought his left arm up sharply. It was a clumsy strike, but it knocked Ennis off of him. Scott was given no time to breathe before one of the other betas came back at him, and Scott acted on instinct, grabbing the man by the front of the uniform and throwing him into the corner of the elevator so hard the glass cracked.  


Again they came at him, and this time Scott fought them off with one arm and one leg, deflecting their shock batons into their own bodies, striking them with all his strength in the soft spaces of their armor and where their body jointed.  


Soon enough, there was enough of a break in the fight that Scott could focus on the fact that one of his arms was pinned to the wall. He tugged once or twice but determined that without any grounding, he was more likely to tear his arm off than move the magnet. So instead, he used the magnet as an anchor and gave a little hop so that he could plant both boots on the wall, on either side of the magnet itself. He braced his right arm with his left, clutching at his own wrists, and used the strength of his legs to tear himself away from the power of the magnet.  


It took too long, but finally the magnet gave way, and Scott flowed seamlessly into a backflip in order to get his feet back on the ground.  


Ennis was standing again, an electric baton in each hand. He had surrendered completely to his shift, fangs showing under the neon blue of his eyes as Ennis panted for breath. He licked his teeth once or twice, nervously, voice distorted by his teeth as he spoke. “Hey, hey, Cap, I just want you to know, this isn’t personal!”  


On the last word, Ennis lunged, both batons active. Scott ducked the first, his hand in an iron grip around Ennis’ wrist, but Ennis made contact with the second one, driving straight into Scott’s gut.  He shocked Scott again, and again, and _again_ , but Scott stubbornly refused to fall. Instead, somehow he rallied his strength, using the hand still on Ennis’ other arm to whip him upwards into the ceiling.  


When he fell, Ennis was already unconscious. Scott snarled down at his body. “Well, it _feels_ personal.”  


He stepped on the side of his shield with one foot, flipping it up into his hand.  


Scott hadn’t even caught his breath when he reached to release the elevator’s safety lock. The doors immediately rolled open to reveal another team of men charging in on his position, guns raised.  


There wasn’t time to think about what he was doing. Scott just spun on his back leg and whipped his shield around in a low arc, cutting through the glass of a nearby wall and the cables that held the elevator up in one smooth motion.  


The elevator dropped like a stone.  


A few floors later, the emergency brake engaged and the elevator shuddered to a stop. Scott dug his claws into the crack between the doors and forced them open, only to find that not only was he halfway between two floors, but both floors he was between were already occupied by squads ready to take him in if he stepped one foot off of that elevator. Scott very quickly came to the conclusion that there were going to be squads all the way down.  


So he only really had one option.  


Scrunching his eyes shut against his own decision, Scott hunkered down to try and get as much of his body behind his shield as he could manage.

  
Then he lunged straight through the glass wall of the elevator and began a freefall plummet to the ground.


	42. Chapter 42

Somehow, by some miracle of science or supernatural grace, Scott didn’t immediately die when he hit the ground.  


Everything exploded into _pain_ , but he wasn’t _dead_. Pain, he could deal with. Pain, he could shoulder his way through. He could still get on his feet while in _pain_. He could still run.  


So he did. He swung his shield back into its holster and began to run at his absolute maximum speed, without any regard for how ridiculous he must have looked, on hands and feet, darting around slower pedestrians, with a huge red-white-and-blue _target_ directly on his back.  


Scott managed to get to the garage he’d parked in before any of them caught up with him. He threw himself on his bike and then threw the bike into motion, tearing out of the garage at a speed he would have otherwise found incredibly inadvisable.  


The bridge that connected Triskelion to the rest of Washington D.C. was already in the process of locking itself down. The heavy metal blast door that would seal the garage was already a third of the way shut. Behind that, there was a barricade lined with rows of vicious-looking spikes that probably could have torn up the tires on some kind of armored personnel carrier, let alone his tiny little motorcycle. Not that Scott was going to let either of those things stop him.  


He gunned his bike and then dragged it into a jump, just managing to squeeze between the closing jaws of the metal door.  


Before he could confront the problem of the spike barrier, a quinjet swung up from under the bridge and hovered in front of him, blocking his way. Over the loudspeaker, the pilot demanded desperately, “Stand down, Captain McCall! Stand down!”  


Scott did not stand down. He continued to drive at maximum speed towards the barrier and the quinjet.  


“I repeat, stand down!” The pilot demanded. From the nose of the quinjet, its minigun dropped, and chugged its way into being armed.  


Scott still did not stand down. Instead, he started to serpentine along the road, dodging the slow targeting of the quinjet as it opened fire on him. Bullets tore into the bridge on either side of him.  


He rode his bike right up until he was nearly under the quinjet’s nose. Scott stood up on the footpegs of the bike and flung his shield at the quinjet, landing it squarely in one of the turbines. As the quinjet began to lose altitude control, Scott pumped the brakes on his bike. It locked up and the back wheel bucked off of the pavement, which Scott used to propel himself upwards towards the quinjet itself.  


He landed on the glass of the pilot’s canopy with his hands and leapfrogged his way over nothing until he was on the back of the plane. From there, he skidded across the surface precariously until he could reach the damaged turbine and pull his shield free of it. The plane rolled violently to the side and Scott let it launch him into the sky, only to redirect his fall into the quinjet’s second turbine. He sliced that apart with his shield, too, and then braced himself near the midline of the plane so that he could throw his shield in a tight triangle. It bounced over both of the engine intakes, trailing fire and sparks. The quinjet began to circle downwards in the sky.  


Scott lept off of it just before it hit the bridge, and landed in a three point stance, using the edge of his shield for one point.  


He didn’t look behind him, not even to ensure that the pilot was okay. Scott just lurched into motion, snapping his shield into place so that he could bolt away on all fours at top speed.  


He didn’t stop running until he made it to the bathroom of the McDonald’s near Washington Circle. Scott closed himself into one of the stalls there and took some time just to catch his breath, his eyes shut and his forehead leaned up against the dirty stall door.  


There was nowhere for Scott to go. He had no one to turn to, no one to trust, no idea of what to do. He was a fugitive now, and well aware of the fact. S.H.I.E.L.D. would be looking for him immediately. They’d have their facial recognition software searching for him soon, if it hadn’t started already. They’d be checking every single security and traffic camera in the Greater D.C. area. His best bet would be to disappear.  


But Scott couldn’t do that. Not without answers. Not without doubling back and finding that USB drive, so he could discover what was on it, what Deaton died to get to him. What was _really_ going on within S.H.I.E.L.D.  


Scott pulled himself back together with a shudder. Before he left the stall, he carefully removed each article of his clothing and checked it for foreign objects, just to ensure he hadn’t been bugged or hit with a tracker. Once Scott was determined he was clean, he stopped long enough to splash his face with cold water and then rushed back out of the McDonald’s before he could be spotted.  


It wasn’t a very far run to the hospital, and Scott mostly managed to hide how hard or unnaturally fast he’d been running as he made his way down into the observation and waiting area he’d been in earlier.  


He did slightly less well at hiding his absolute horror at discovering that all of that unappetising sugar free gum had been bought out of the vending machine, and the USB drive that Deaton had given him was missing.  


Scott was still staring at his own frazzled, haunted expression in the reflection of the vending machine glass when Allison stepped into his view from behind him. She was chewing gum, and when she snapped the bubble just behind and to the left of Scott’s ear, he could smell traces of aspartame.  


It was all he could do to swallow the instinctive growl that Scott wanted to give as he turned to grab Allison by her forearm, just below the elbow, and steer her into a nearby vacant room. The growl still lingered on the edges of his words anyway. “ _Where is it_? What did you do with it?”  


“I’m keeping it safe.” Allison responded, her chin jerking up a little in defiance of Scott’s aggression. “And not leaving it where literally anyone could see it and get to it.”  


She had a point, but Scott was already too close to the end of his rope to concede it. He just lifted one corner of his lips, mutely grateful he wasn’t _actually_ showing off his fangs. “I’m going to need it back, Widow.”  


Her head shook, but what she _said_ was, “Where did you get it?”  


“I’m not telling you.”  


Allison’s dark eyes flicked over his face, collecting data. Whatever she saw, it lead her to an expert conclusion, because a moment later she was allowing the thinnest sliver of surprise to flash over her face. “Deaton gave it to you. Why? What’s on it?”  


Scott growled, low in his throat, unable to hold it back any longer. “Why are you asking me? You must already know, just like you must have known that somebody inside S.H.I.E.L.D. hired the pirates.”  


Pursing her lips together, Allison looked down at Scott’s jawline and then back to his eyes. She wasn’t afraid to make eye contact, and never had been. Now was no exception. “I had my suspicions. Nothing concrete.”  


“Do you have _anything_ concrete?” Scott demanded, trying to restrain the urge to shake Allison in his frustration.  


With a voice like cool steel, she countered with, “I know who killed Deaton.”  


Everything in Scott’s head slammed to a halt with a shriek of brakes. “...you _what_?”  


“Most people don’t believe he’s real. A few people, like me, know better. Five years ago, I was escorting a nuclear engineer out of Iran. We had our tires shot out, and we rolled off of the road. I got us out of the wreck, covered my engineer. This guy was already there. He shot the engineer dead straight through me.” Allison raised her shirt then, so briefly, to show an ugly scar in her lower stomach. She touched it with two fingertips before letting the cloth cover it again. “French bullet, no rifling, untraceable.”  


“Is that it? That isn’t much to go on.” Scott frowned. He let his grip on Allison relax a little bit, but he didn’t let her go.  


The gesture she made wasn’t quite dismissive enough to be a shrug, but it gave a certain amount of the same attitude. “He’s a ghost. Stories, rumors, rarely anything else to go on. The people in the intelligence community that believe in him at all call him the Argent Wolfhound.”  


The whole name felt like a slap across Scott’s face. _Now_ , he released Allison, just to rock back into his own space, blinking too many times. “Argent like...like _your family_ Argent?”  


“Yeah.” Allison straightened her stance, again, tugging at the bottom of her shirt to realign it. When she was done, she rolled the USB drive out of... _somewhere_...and offered it to Scott between two fingers. “Yeah, Argent like my family Argent, and _Wolfhound_ like he was made to kill wolves. If you believe the deep rumors, he’s been responsible for the assassination of over thirty people in the last fifty years, many of them werewolves. Not that I can confirm anything. He’s impossible to find, and trust me, I’ve tried.”

  
Scott felt his jaw tighten, but he was gentle as he reached out to accept the drive and tuck it up against his palm. It felt hotter and heavier than it should, but he knew that was just his in his mind. “...well, you never had a True Alpha helping you out before. Let’s go ghost hunting.”


	43. Chapter 43

They boosted a car out of the hospital parking lot, despite the protestations of Scott’s overgrown sense of guilt. Allison drove while Scott sat hunched down in the passenger seat, trying not to get caught on camera. He remained painfully, almost achingly aware of Deaton’s instructions not to trust anyone, but he couldn’t do this on his own, and Allison had an impressive set of skills that were useful in _just this scenario_ exactly.  


First stop was a bolthouse, where Allison had them both change clothes. He wasn’t sure how or why she’d gotten ahold of things that fit him, but she had, and in such an impressive array that it was easy for her to pick out articles that Scott wouldn’t have otherwise worn. A hoodie and too many layers, a pair of fake glasses and a dark, fitted baseball cap later, Scott was at least confident enough that he wouldn’t be recognized from a hundred paces as _the famous_ Captain America.  


After the bolthouse, Allison drove them to a nearby mall. She met Scott’s look of half-scandalized confusion with a cocky little grin. “Just trust me.”  


Strangely, Scott found that he did.  


She took them through the mall to an Apple store with the confidence of a woman who visited Apple stores a lot. Without flinching or stopping to talk to one of the store employees, Allison walked straight to one of the laptops on display and plugged the USB drive in. Her voice was so low as she spoke, Scott wouldn’t be surprised if only he could hear her. “S.H.I.E.L.D. will have a tracking program on this that just activated. We have nine minutes.”  


Nine minutes sounded like it wasn’t nearly enough time to get very, very far away from this Apple Store. It especially didn’t sound like it was enough time when Allison’s expression began to furrow with what seemed to be frustration.

Scott leaned in, staring at the screen of the computer. He couldn’t make any sense of the information scrolling past at high speed, but he was pretty sure it wasn’t supposed to be doing what it was doing. “What’s going on?”  


“The encryption on this is … a level beyond. I don’t know if I’m going to be able to pull the intelligence off of this in time.”  


Fear threatened to clutch at Scott’s throat. “Then what do we do?”  


Allison responded with a tight-lipped smile, but she didn’t look up at him. “I can trace it. It’ll take a little while, but I can do it. We might not be able to find out what the information is, yet, but we can find out where it came from.”  


It was not an ideal answer. Scott didn’t _like_ it, as answers went. Still, he had no better answer, so he nodded, trying not to crush the table surface beneath his hands out of frustration and anxiety.  


Naturally, it was right as those feelings of frustration and anxiety were spiking that the Apple employee sidled up to them. He was sunny and cheerful, and Scott had no reason to believe he was anything than what he appeared to be, no matter how intrusive that was. “Can I help you guys with anything?”  


“No, thank you, that--” Scott started, but he was immediately interrupted by Allison.  


She looked up at the Apple store clerk with a sunny smile, disarming at its very core, and spoke with a conspiratory tone. “Oh, please don’t tell anyone, we’re just borrowing your wifi for a little bit. Our phones get terrible reception here! We’re looking up honeymoon destinations, we’ll be _so_ quick.”  


Scott tried to stammer through _something_ that would coincide with Allison’s implication that they were going to get _married_ , but luckily for him, it wasn’t necessary. The store clerk brightened immediately, moving like he was going to try and look at the screen himself. “Oh, sweet!  Congrats. Where are you guys planning?”  


All three of them watched as the computer whirred and spat out a location somewhere in New Jersey. The Apple employee’s whole face shaded with something like confusion. “...Jersey? You’re gonna honeymoon in Jersey?”  


“Cape May is really beautiful in the spring. It has a lot of small-town charm to it.” Scott interjected, before the Apple guy could ask any more questions.  


There must have been something just curt enough about his answer, because the store clerk’s face fell a little. He rocked back onto his heels, making a brief gesture as if to indicate he was, in fact, backing off. “Cool, cool, gotcha. If you guys need anything, just let me know, okay?”  


Once he was out of range, Scott turned his face back to Allison. “New Jersey?”  


“Does the town of Wheaton mean anything to you?”  


Somehow, Scott managed to bite back what would have otherwise been a bitter laugh. “Yeah, I know something about it. I’ll tell you on the way.”  


With a nod, Allison pulled the USB drive free of the computer and pocketed it. They left the store at as calm a pace they could afford and immediately turned towards a different mall entrance than the one they entered with.  


Fifteen paces or less from the store, Scott realized he was picking up on familiar scents. With the smallest amount of focus, he could sort through the crowd and single out the S.H.I.E.L.D. agents coming to capture them. He kept his voice low as he explained, “They’re trying to pincer us, but they haven’t noticed us yet. Two behind, two ahead, two in that side passage there. If they make--”  


Abruptly, Allison made a sound of rejection. “Just put your arm over my shoulders and laugh. Keep your face down, but not too down.”  


There was no time to question why, or the sanity of Allison’s plan. Scott just did as she instructed. As he did, Allison tucked her head in close to his and _tittered_. It was a sound he absolutely wouldn’t have thought she was even capable of making.  


Yet it worked. Her schoolgirl giggle got them right past the plainclothes S.H.I.E.L.D. agents trying to box them in at the Apple store. They immediately got onto the nearest escalator, headed downwards towards the mall’s metro stop.  


They had made it about a third of the way down the crowded escalator when they simultaneously spotted the next pair of S.H.I.E.L.D. agents coming up on the opposite side. At this proximity, there was no way they were going to get out without being spotted. Scott let his body start to grow tense, trying to do the math to determine how they could escape with the least risk to the civilians surrounding them.  


“Kiss me.” Allison demanded, an instant later, cutting through his mental trigonometry like a butcher with a fillet knife.  


“ _What?_ ” Scott demanded right back.  


She didn’t explain herself. She just reached up and and grabbed Scott by the back of his head, dragging him down into a kiss.  


The whole world seemed to spin and twist on its axis. It wasn’t Scott’s first kiss, but it might as _well_ have been; he suddenly couldn’t remember that he’d ever kissed anyone else, that he’d ever had the _desire_ to kiss anyone else. There was just Allison’s mouth, soft on his own, her scent filling his nose, the gentle way she guided him through the kiss itself like she wanted to make sure he wasn’t left behind on any of its many, intricate steps.  


And then she just _pulled away_ , as abrupt as a car crash. “Public displays of affection make people uncomfortable. They look away on reflex.”  


Scott’s head was still spinning. He gripped the handrail of the escalator and tried to catch his breath. “Y--yeah.”

  
Somehow, he managed to find enough balance to walk reasonably normally as they made their way down to the metro station and onto the next outbound train.


	44. Chapter 44

By the time they got off of the subway and stole a second car, Scott had come back to himself enough to feel guilty about it. He understood it was necessary, and that this mission that he and Allison had put themselves on was bigger even than just the two of them, but he still hated it. Maybe when all of this was over, he’d take the car back, or somehow arrange for its owner to be reimbursed.  


They settled in for the drive from D.C. to New Jersey. For a long time, there was no conversation. Scott tried to focus on driving while Allison scanned through the radio stations on both bands, just to be sure there was nothing reporting their flight. It wasn’t until they had been on I-295 for a while that Allison spoke up. “So you said you knew something about Wheaton. You planning to fill me in before we get there, or is this going to be some kind of surprise tour?”  


Scott snorted, unsure whether he was amused or just exhausted. “Camp Lehigh is in Wheaton, New Jersey, or it used to be. After the serum transformation, the Army decided I needed to go through basic, or at least a part of it, to justify any of their little program. That’s where Stiles and I went through the wringer before we got spat back out into combat on the other side.”  


Allison’s thoughtful frown was accompanied with a soft little noise in the front of her throat. “That can’t be coincidence.”  


“Nothing in my life is ever _coincidence_.” Scott agreed.  


Silence stretched for another mile or two before Allison broke it again. She sounded more gentle, this time, less like she was trying to tease Scott and more like she was trying to tease something _out_ of him that she was afraid would cause him pain. “You don’t talk about Stiles much.”  


Pain lanced through him, as it always did when he thought of Stiles. It was worse, this time, or maybe just different, as it compounded with the guilt bound with the idea that somebody-- _anybody--_ that knew Scott could be ignorant of what Stiles had meant to him, by _Scott’s_ own omission. He couldn’t close his eyes to weather the swell of emotion, so he just kind of stared at the road for a while.  


His voice was rough when he finally managed to speak again. “What do you want to know about him?”  


“Who he was to you?”  


The question was too large to have an answer.  


Scott didn’t even know how to approach it. Every time he can around to it from a different angle, it just threatened to all fall over and crush him, a boulder made out of longing and guilt and grief.  


He tried for a while, anyway, even going so far as to open his mouth a few times to start to speak. He could never get the words out, not until Scott surrendered enough to admit in a low, dusky voice. “I don’t...I don’t think I can talk about him right now. Maybe later, when this is all over.”  


Allison made a soft, thoughtful noise and didn’t press the issue.  


It didn’t take them much longer to get to what was left of Camp Lehigh. Even from the fence, it had clearly been out of commission for a long time. There were plenty of signs posted around, declaring the land property of the U.S. Government and off-limits to unauthorized personnel. Scott used one to cover over the place where he clawed open a hole in the fence and he and Allison slipped through.  


They paced the derelict camp slowly, Allison’s face tipped down towards her phone as they moved. She could have been any other bored young woman reading her texts, but Scott knew different. She was tracing that data stream, trying to find a source to the signal. “This place is cheerful.”

Scott gave a low snort, head shaking. “It was an army training camp. It wasn’t supposed to be _cheerful_. But, in its defense, it looked a lot better in the 40s. Livelier, at least.”  


Most of the buildings were still in the same place, huddled together in neat rows. They largely looked as if they hadn’t been touched since the War, despite the fact that Scott knew there’d been Wars _after_ that one, and they _must_ have been used for something, at some point. It didn’t seem to matter. They all loomed in his periphery like ghosts, flickering shadows of what once was.  


All except _one_ building. That building, Scott had no memory of.  


He was just about to _say_ as much when Allison made a small noise of disgust, her hand dropping to her side with her phone in it. “I’m not getting anything. No heat signature, no signal, _nothing_. This was a decoy.”  


Scott shook his head, gesturing that she should follow him as he approached the one building that was out of place. “This shouldn’t be here. This is the only thing that wasn’t here before. We should check it out.”  


Allison glanced at Scott, like she was skeptical of his reasoning, but his instincts were screaming at him, and Allison seemed to be able to pick up on that. She nodded and fell into step just behind him.  


The lock on the door didn’t stand up very well to the combination of a True Alpha’s strength and the sharp edge of his shield. The room was dark, but it didn’t smell musty or unused like Scott would have expected. Instead, as they stepped into the building, the overhead lighting started to click on automatically, row by row.  


The entire building was filled with banks and banks of computers that looked like they’d come from the seventies. In the very center was a collection of monitors and keyboards, an obvious control nexus for the massive amounts of magnetic tape drives that lined the walls.  


“This stuff is _ancient_.” Allison said, something like awe in her voice. She glanced over her shoulder at Scott a moment later, while pacing between the rows of machines, smirking a little. “Sorry. No offense meant.”  


Scott answered with a smirk of his own. “They were still working on the first computer when I went under the ice. I think it was even bigger than all of this. Nobody ever thought it would work, much less that we’d have ones thousands of times more powerful in our pockets.”  


Allison’s response to that was simply a small, distracted noise. She stepped in closer to that center console, reaching with one hand to point at something on the surface of it. “Hey, Cap, look at this.”  


Scott obliged by swinging around so that whatever Allison was pointing at could be in his line of sight. He realized as he approached that she was pointing to a USB hub, far newer than anything else around them, which had been jury-rigged into the wiring of the archaic computer system. It looked suspicious and out of place.  


It also looked like it matched the USB drive currently in Allison’s hand.  


With a gesture of one hand, Scott indicated that Allison should go ahead and plug the USB drive in. Whatever happened, it was better than the answer of _nothing at all_. It wasn’t like it could be a _worse_ answer than this being the end of the line.  


Deftly, Allison flipped the drive over in her hand and plugged it in. Immediately, the machine that surrounded them began to whir to live, tape drives and fans groaning with the effort of doing their jobs. One of the monitors on the control nexus blinked active, jolting green on a darker background which read: INITIATE SYSTEM REBOOT? (Y/N)  


Just as deftly, Allison reached out and pressed a single button on the keyboard. Y.  


The monitor spilled out lines and lines of text, too fast for Scott to read them. A camera extended on an antenna, pivoting with old, noisy motors to focus on their faces, one after the other. Finally, a second monitor flickered to life, showing an image that Scott _wanted_ to resolve into a face but couldn’t quite make it, given all the static in it and how poor the contrast was between the dark green and the black.  


A voice spoke, abruptly, out of an unseen speaker, “Ah, _Captain McCall_. I was wondering when I would finally see you again.”

  
Scott sucked in a sudden breath over teeth that desperately wanted to be fangs as he realized he _knew_ that _voice_.


	45. Chapter 45

“ _Zola_.” Scott snarled, his lip curling over the rotten taste of the name.  


The voice from the computer only laughed, full of malice, but Allison’s eyes narrowed. She pulled her head back a little, and then peered up at Scott, calculations running mile-a-minute behind her eyes. “You know that voice?”  


“He was the key scientist for the Argent arm of the Nazi machine.” It wasn’t that Scott _couldn’t_ restrain his absolute disdain, his _disgust_ at the mere concept of Zola. It was that he _wouldn’t_ , he didn’t see the point in it. “Capturing him was our objective the day that Stiles fell.”  


“And now someone has put his voice into this S.H.I.E.L.D. computer for some reason?” Allison looked back at the computer itself, frowning.  


Again, the computer _laughed_. It was utterly, unnervingly clear that it could _hear_ them, and was responding to their conversation. “Oh, much more than just _his voice_ , my dear. The 60’s were a strange time for all of us. Such a shame you missed them, Captain.”  


Scott’s response was a low, rumbling growl.  


“You see,” Zola’s image continued, clearly unconcerned with Scott’s mostly-empty threat, “After I was captured by S.H.I.E.L.D., I was offered asylum and immunity from my part in the war if I would use my mind for S.H.I.E.L.D.’s agenda. The other option amounted to death. Of course, I took S.H.I.E.L.D.’s offer. And of course, I continued to further the ideals of the Argents in secret. I played the good little reformed scientist when I must. Then, the sixties happened, and I was faced with a diagnosis of a terminal illness. There was no hope for a cure. But there _was_ this cutting edge technology that S.H.I.E.L.D. had been working on. I was their perfect little pet, redeemed, so helpful. They never suspected a thing. Instead, they supported me. Helped me build a program that could house my very _mind_. And now, here I am, as sharp as I ever was. And here _you_ are, still one step behind.”  


There was something almost awe-struck in Allison’s voice, if someone could be both awe-struck and disgusted. “You _hid_. You hid inside of S.H.I.E.L.D. and rotted it from within.”  


“Of course.” Somehow, it seemed like the staticky, indistinct image of Zola was grinning maliciously. “What good is a hunter if he doesn’t know the value of camouflage?”  


It was so obviously a reference, but Scott didn’t get it. He furrowed his brows, glancing between Zola and Allison. “A hunter?”  


Allison bowed her head for a moment, as if she didn’t want to answer the question. Still, the answer came, turned over in her mouth with unhappiness. “It’s the Argent family creed. _Nous chassons ceux qui nous chassent._ ‘We hunt those who hunt us.’ It used to mean something, before Gerard and his sect twisted it up.”  


“Humanity does not know how to protect itself. As a whole, humans are stupid, ignorant, witless. They dabble with things they cannot understand the danger of. The Argents stand as the last line of defense between humanity and their own shortcomings.” Zola’s image explained, as if it was at all a reasonable way of looking at the world.  


“ _Humanity_ doesn’t need someone to protect it from _itself_.” Scott growled, his hand tensing around his shield’s grip. “ _Humanity_ should be free to make its own mistakes, and learn from them!”  


Still, Zola chuckled, with a sound like he continued to have the upper hand despite the fact that he was a _computer_. “Well, there, we disagree emphatically. The difference is, _we_ have all of the power, and you have none of it, so I imagine our plan will continue unimpeded.”  


“And what, exactly, is that plan? How is it that the rest of S.H.I.E.L.D. hasn’t found you out already?” There was something overly tight in Allison’s voice. This was personal.  


The image on the computer screen changed, suddenly, to show a slideshow of events in history that Scott had missed. They seemed to be moments of chaos, of violence, men fighting amongst each other, or reports of sudden deaths and assassinations. “The world is in chaos. It is dangerous, disorderly. Things happen, sometimes, people die. Leaves the world feeling just a little less safe. Leaves people _looking_ for protection. Looking for something to _blame_. And who do you think they’re going to blame but these mad supernatural creatures? After _all_ , the world made _sense_ before they showed up.”  


Scott narrowed his eyes, trying to make sense of what Zola was saying. Something in it just didn’t seem to add up. “But I _met_ Gerard. I saw what he was doing. He turned himself _into_ a werewolf. That doesn’t exactly fit in with not wanting werewolves to exist.”  


“Oh, but doesn’t it? We eradicate you all from the world, and there are no more werewolves left who stubbornly insist on forging their own path. Then, once that’s accomplished, it will be so easy to reintroduce them into the world. On _our_ terms.” The utter, obsequious smugness of Zola’s voice made it difficult for Scott to focus on anything else.  


And yet, what was really being said was so utterly clear. “You mean, under your _control_. You’re committing a genocide so that you can rule unchecked with a superpowered army!”  


“I suppose you could frame it that way, if you insisted.” Zola sounded speculative, now, underneath that oily layer of superiority. “Either way, I think you’ll agree that Project Insight will make the task of eradicating your kind much, much easier.”  


Scott’s voice dropped low, dangerous, with a hard edge he almost never used. “I’ll _stop_ you. I’ll stop the whole project. I won’t allow this to happen. There are thousands of innocent supernaturals out there. I’m going to save them. I’m going to save _everyone_.”  


There, Zola gave the most sinister laugh of all. It was a sound of utter malice, made no kinder by the digital filter it was run through. “No, no, dear Captain, I think you’ll find you will save _no one_. Not even yourself.”  


Without any further warning, the doors to the bunker slammed shut.  


An alarm started screaming from Allison’s phone. She snatched it out of her pocket to check, only to go pale. She turned the phone to show its display to Scott, but all he really needed to see was her wide eyes, the sound of her voice, “...missile incoming. We’ve got a minute or two, tops.”  


“ _What?!_ ” Scott snapped, immediately pivoting from the control console to search the room with half-panicked eyes, looking for some solution or promise of escape. “Where is it even _coming_ from?”  


“Triskelion Headquarters.” Was Allison’s only, grim response.  


Scott’s heart dropped out of his chest and down through the floor. The Argents really _did_ control S.H.I.E.L.D. entirely. He had nowhere to turn to.  


But that still didn’t mean he could just _give up_. People were in danger, and Scott wasn’t about to just lay down and wait for a missile to take him out when there was even the smallest chance he could help them. He let his eyes bleed red and finally, with the help of his Alpha sight, he caught onto something that might give them even the tiniest of advantages.  


A metal grate in the floor which lead into a series of shallow trenches dug into the concrete, lined with neatly bundled bunches of cables. It wasn’t _much_ , but it was _something_ , which was all Scott could hope for in the space of ‘a minute or two’.  


He fell upon the grating with his entire strength, digging his clawed fingers in through the gaps in it and hacking at it with his shield until it came free of the floor. Then, without so much as asking permission, Scott reached out to grab Allison by one arm and drag her into the trench. He covered her with his body, holding his shield up above them to protect their heads and shoulders, and closed his eyes.

  
Moments later, the world erupted into fire and shrapnel.


	46. Chapter 46

When the pain and the noise and the burning finally abated, Scott was shocked to discover he was still alive.

Below him, still half-curled into a fetal position, was Allison. Her face showed the same utter shock that Scott was feeling. Somehow, she seemed to have survived the blast relatively unscathed. Scott couldn’t particularly say the same of himself, but his body was already busy knitting those injuries back together, so ultimately, maybe it didn’t matter.

He wanted to stay, to wait and recover, until he didn’t feel quite so much like his body was still being torn apart, but Scott knew they had no time. He could hear a helicopter in the near distance, getting closer, and he just couldn’t afford to believe it wasn’t coming  _ right here _ to check the rubble for their bodies.

They couldn’t allow there to be bodies here to be found.

So Scott took a deep breath and gathered his strength. He braced his shoulders and hands against the underside of his shield, dug both heels in against the ground beneath him. With a mighty shove, he managed to toss off the rubble that had collapsed in on them. The smell of smoke and dust was cut through by fresher air.

Scott hopped up onto some of the more stable wreckage around them and offered a hand down to help Allison cover the same distance. “We need to move. They’re coming to make sure that missile finished us off. They’re going to know it didn’t, but we need to not be here when they figure that out.”

“Agreed.” Allison managed, breathing heavy through the aftermath of a  _ missile strike _ . She seemed baffled a moment later when Scott handed her his shield, but the bafflement didn’t last. She shifted her grip on it so that when Scott turned to present his back to her, it was easy for her to swing up into a piggy-back ride.

It wasn’t dignified, but it meant that Scott could take off at top speed without leaving Allison behind to be found by the dirty S.H.I.E.L.D. agents.

They ran to the nearest town and stole a  _ third _ car. Scott wasn’t any happier about it than he had been the first two times, but he was beginning to see the necessity. They started driving south again, towards DC without thinking of another place to go. They had just about crossed out of New Jersey when Allison began to talk. Her voice was quiet and almost shamed, small and lost in a way he had never heard her before. “I...I don’t know where to go. We need to go to ground and lose some heat but...my entire support structure was S.H.I.E.L.D. They were my only ticket away from my family, and my family’s brainwashing. Now it turns out I never got away from it at all, and--”

Sympathy passed through Scott’s chest. He reached out briefly with one hand to touch at the knuckles of Allison’s, trying to settle her. “Hey, hey. We’re going to figure it out. We’re going to do something about this. I have...someone. I think. Someone that will help us. But I don’t know his address, so I need you to help me out here.”

Allison took an unsteady breath in, and closed her eyes. She recentered herself somehow, in the space of a quarter mile or less, and then nodded, eyes flicking open again. “I can help. What’s his name? I’ll find him.”

“Mason Hewitt. He’s ex-USAF.” Scott explained, hoping he wasn’t dooming Mason by dragging him into this absolute mess.

Allison dove into the task of finding Mason on her phone while Scott drove. By the time they were entering the D.C. suburbs, she had an actual address. It turned out to be a modest three-story rowhouse, brickface with white shutters and a tiny porch with just about enough space for one chair on it. Scott didn’t let himself prevaricate, he just walked up to the door and rang the bell.

It wasn’t until Mason answered, surprise clear on his face, that Scott realized that on  _ top _ of being painfully aware that Mason never told him his address, both Scott and Allison were covered in filth from the missile strike.

Silence hung over their head for three or four seconds before Mason offered, much too mild for the situation, “...hey, dude.”

It was as if the sound of Mason’s voice released Scott’s ability to explain himself. His hands lifted into the air, palms towards Mason, in a gesture of calming. “I’m...I’m really sorry about this, I just had  _ nowhere else _ to go.”

From just behind him, Allison’s voice piped up, quiet and dry, “Everyone we know is trying to kill us.”

Something in Mason’s expression softened, and he took a step back to allow them both into his house. “That’s not  _ entirely _ true.”

They ended up gathered around Mason’s kitchen table, explaining the entire situation as Mason cooked a breakfast of cheesy scrambled eggs and toast. Scott hadn’t even realized how hungry he was for real food until Mason set a plate in front of him and all Scott could focus on was getting it into his stomach. He must have told Mason it was  _ really good, man _ at least five times.

Breakfast couldn’t last forever. Once it was over, Scott sat leaned over the table, hands circled around his empty glass as he spoke. “So the short of it is that we know that S.H.I.E.L.D. was totally compromised from the inside by the Argents. Someone at Triskelion knew we were in Jersey and ordered a missile strike on their own asset to eliminate us. We have to assume Zola’s work, if not  _ Zola himself _ , was backed up somewhere, which means sooner rather than later, S.H.I.E.L.D. is going to launch Project Insight and use it to murder anyone they deem ‘supernatural’ on the planet. We’re talking thousands of lives. On top of that, I’m certain that Alexander Deucalion is involved. He  _ has _ to be behind the Wolf Squad attacking me on my way out of Triskelion.”

“So basically, you are both on the run from S.H.I.E.L.D., possibly the largest and most effective intelligence organization in the world, and you want to  _ infiltrate _ its  _ global headquarters _ so that you can get more information about how they’re going to murder all of the people  _ like you _ .” Mason sounded weirdly reasonable while he explained what he understood, eyes flicking between Scott and Allison.

Allison actually shrugged, faintly, admitting without shame. “Yeah, that’s about it.”

Mason gave a soft, quick nod. “Well, I’m in.”

It seemed almost too easy. Scott straightened, blinking slowly, as he considered Mason’s face, the tick of his heartbeat and the profile of his scent. None of it seemed like lying. “...are you sure? This is dangerous. It could be deadly.”

“I’ve seen deadly before.” Mason shrugged as casually as Allison had, as if it  _ weren’t _ nearly as big of a deal as Scott  _ felt _ it was. “I was in pararescue to  _ save _ people. There are a whole lot of people who need saving, and you need my help doing it. Of  _ course _ I can help. I can even get my wings.”

There, Scott balked. He went from ‘straightened’ to ‘leaning back’ entirely, eyes wide. “You’re going to steal a  _ plane _ from the  _ military _ ?”

Mason’s eyebrows furrowed, and he laughed, head shaking. “No, man, not a plane. I don’t fly planes. Here, hold on.”

He stood, then, and vanished off into somewhere into his house. Maybe five minutes of silence and awkward glances exchanged with Allison later, Mason returned with a manila folder. The front of it was stamped with military print, declaring it information on something called Project Falcon. When Scott took the folder from Mason and opened it, it became suddenly clear that  _ Project Falcon _ was a personal jetpack and wings apparatus which allowed an individual soldier to fly, unimpeded by the restraints of an entire airplane. He didn’t know how to respond to any of it with anything other than a quiet, “... _ oh _ .”

Allison leaned in to look over Scott’s shoulder, eyebrows lifting. “ _ Impressive _ .”

“But how are we going to get in?” Scott frowned, still distracted by the technology used to make the Falcon wings. It was so far beyond anything he’d seen in the 40s. The modern world just continued to surprise him. “S.H.I.E.L.D. knows I’ve gone rogue. They must know that you have, too. We don’t have the clearance to get _i_ _ nto _ Triskelion anymore, much less find what we need to stop them.”

It only took Allison a few moments to come up with a solution, her fingers snapping. “Sitwell. He was on the  _ Lemurian Star _ . There was no reason for an officer that high-ranking to  _ be _ there unless he was delivering part of Zola’s algorithm to the satellites.  _ He’ll _ be able to get in, and  _ he’s _ not a soldier. We should be able to convince him. We go get him.”

Scott knew exactly what kind of  _ convincing _ that Allison meant. He didn’t like it, but they really had no alternative.

  
Mason seemed to understand that, too, because he brightened at the notion, reaching out to reclaim the folder from Scott. He spoke with the determination of a man who’d already made his final decision. “We can take my car.”


	47. Chapter 47

It took ten minutes or less for Allison to track down where Sitwell was supposed to be.  


They piled into Mason’s car, Scott riding shotgun and Allison situated in the backseat. They were only on the road for a few miles before an unsettling sense of doom settled in around Scott’s shoulders. That sense of far-off screaming was back, scraping at the edge of his hearing. Dizziness came next, to the point of nausea, strong enough that Scott had to reach out and put one hand against the door of the car, as if bracing himself to get through it.  


Naturally, both Mason and Allison noticed. Mason glanced to Scott once or twice before asking in a concerned tone, “What’s up?”  


Scott scrunched his eyes shut briefly, trying to ride out the disorienting sensations. “Something’s **wrong**.”  


Seconds later, a metallic arm burst through the roof of the car and attempted to drag Allison out.  


She managed to leverage herself against the seats and pull out of its grasp. As soon as she was free, Allison flung herself into the front of the car, seemingly moving on instinct. It was a good thing she did, because it was only Allison’s quick motions, shoving Scott and Mason into uncomfortable positions, that saved them from getting bullets in their heads as the man on the roof of the car fired into it with a silenced pistol. One of the bullets imbedded itself into the car seat headrest near Scott’s face, and he could instantly smell the traces of wolfsbane it carried.

 

Mason immediately slammed the car into park and hauled on the handbrake.  


The tires squealed, the car threatened to fishtail out of control, but Mason kept it in line as it came to a hard stop. The man on the top of the car was flung forward, tumbling headfirst towards the asphalt.  


Somehow, instead, he twisted in the air and ended in a three point crouch, skidding backwards. He reached down with his metal arm and jammed its fingers into the road, digging gouges in the concrete surface as he used it to slow himself down. When he’d finally stopped moving, the man dislodged his fingers from the road and stood up.  


It was the same man who had shot Director Deaton, in the same black outfit and the same black facemask, this time complete with darkened goggles.  


It was _The Argent Wolfhound_.  


They didn’t have very much time to come to that conclusion, let alone _gawk_ , before a heavily armored SWAT-style van slammed into them from behind.  


It flung them towards the Argent Wolfhound and then kept going, as if it were determined to use them to run him down. The Wolfhound didn’t flinch. Instead, at the very last instant, he sent himself into some sort of aerial cartwheel. He cleared the hood of Mason’s car with an otherworldly grace and landed back on the roof.  


Allison began scrambling in the tight confines of the front seat she was currently sharing with Scott, clearly trying to reach for a gun. Mason pumped the brakes again, as if they would do anything to stop the mass and the engine of the truck currently shoving them across the highway. Scott was more or less trapped completely under Allison’s squirming body, unable to do anything at all.  


The Argent Wolfhound punched through the windshield, again with his metallic arm. This time he wrapped his fingers around the steering wheel and ripped it free of the car entirely with one horrific sound of shrieking metal.  


Mason was left grasping where the steering wheel used to be. “What the _hell_?”  


The car was rapidly coming apart and the situation was rapidly becoming one they really didn’t want to be in. Allison finally found the gun she’d been searching for and crawled out of Scott’s lap to more or less drape herself over Mason’s, twisting so that she could get anything even approaching an angle on the Argent Wolfhound. There was a clattering of noise as he leapt off of their car and out of Allison’s line of fire, instead landing on the hood of the truck that had rammed them.  


Scott used the moment to retrieve his shield. He braced it against the door on his side of the car, and then tugged Allison back into his lap, trying to shelter her between the door and his body. Reaching behind him, he blindly grabbed onto the nearest part of Mason he could get his hands on, and shouted desperately, “Hold on!”  


He slammed his weight into his shield and tore the car’s door off of its hinges in the process. The three of them spilled out of the car and onto the highway, still moving at speed, with little other than the door and Scott’s shield to cut their momentum. They were honestly lucky the truck didn’t immediately run them over.  


Instead, they slid out of its range and it sped past them. The skidded to the side of the road, perilously close to rebounding off of the concrete barrier in the middle.  


Scott lost control of the slide pathetically quickly. He lost his grip on Mason, first, and managed a harried glance behind them only to see Mason in a barely-controlled roll, burning off his momentum before he could pop back up onto his feet. Allison went next, and Scott wasn’t honestly sure if she’d done so willingly or not. Either way, a few moments later, Scott managed to find his feet, staggering a little from the disorientation of their exit from the car and that terrible _chaos_ that seemed to rule all of his supernatural senses any time that the Argent Wolfhound was around.  


He managed to get himself turned to see that the truck had stopped, and that the Argent Wolfhound had some kind of compact rocket launcher in his hands. Terror spiked its way through Scott. He only just got his shield raised in time to protect his head and shoulders, before the rocket slammed into it like a blow from God.  


It blasted Scott off of his feet, hit him so hard and threw him back so fast that there was a moment where Scott thought he might have been tearing free of his body entirely.  


But Scott had no such luck. Instead, he was cast right over the side of the overpass they’d stopped on. He fell like a comet and crashed straight through the windshield of a city bus.  


He collapsed in the aisle on the crest of a wave of pain, the entire world spinning out of control around him.  


When Scott came to again, it was to the sound of gunfire. Somehow, the bus had ended up on its side. The civilians had evacuated through the shattered hole in the windshield that Scott had come through. He could still see them fleeing. One man stopped and turned as if to go back into the bus for Scott, but Scott managed to find a hand to wave him off.  


It turned out to be just as well, because instants later, there was the tell-tale whine of a minigun powering up, and the cabin of the bus became a constant hail of bullets.  


Scott scrambled along the floor of the bus, barely managing to keep ahead of the bullet spray. He busted out the emergency exit in the back of the bus with his shoulder, and tumbled out onto the street. Luck would have it that his shield was within reach of where Scott ended up, allowing him to grab it and swing it into place. The sound of the minigun became overwhelmed the disharmonic pings of the bullets rebounding off of the vibranium of the shield.  


Slowly, Scott started to advance on the gunman. It was a constant effort, because any moment that he misjudged where the gunman was aiming, he risked an absolute barrage of bullets, in his feet or legs or _head_ if he wasn’t careful enough. He’d gotten within feet of the man and was considering the merits of throwing his shield to make the bullets stop when a second gun rang out, this time from above him.  


The man with the minigun crumpled, and Scott peered upwards to see Mason leaning over the side of the overpass, an automatic rifle in his hands. “I got this! Go find Black Widow!”  


Scott took off at a dead run.  


It wasn’t that hard to find Allison, even in all the chaos and the gunfire. At first, all he had to do was follow the scent of her blood, maddeningly persistent over the scents of everything else. Then, as he got closer, all he had to do was run headlong into the cacophony of sensory overload that meant the Argent Wolfhound was nearby.  


The Wolfhound had her pinned down behind a car. Allison was crouched behind it, one hand on the opposite shoulder where she’d obviously been shot. The Argent Wolfhound was standing on the hood, rifle in hand, with every clear indication that he intended to shoot. Scott let out a roar of anger and charged right in.  


The Wolfhound turned at the sound of the roar, and Scott managed to swing his shield up before the inhumanly strong punch came in from the Wolfhound’s metal arm. It slammed into Scott’s shield instead, and the entire thing rang from the impact, a sound Scott had only ever heard once before, when Thor had done much the same thing with her hammer.  


This time there was no shockwave. There were only tremors through the shield as the Wolfhound pressed on it. Scott jerked it to the side and lashed out with his claws. He took one of the Wolfhound’s legs out, but even as he fell the Wolfhound kicked out with the other leg and sent Scott sprawling backwards. He rolled with the momentum of the strike and came back up into a crouch behind his shield, but it was enough time for the Argent Wolfhound to exchange his rifle for a fully automatic pistol.  


Several short bursts of bullets ricocheted off of the shield, all reeking of wolfsbane. Scott somehow managed to get in close again despite that, batting away the pistol with a swipe of his shield. He pulled it back a second time to try and clock the Wolfhound in the face with its edge.  


Instead, like before, the Argent Wolfhound caught the shield with his metal hand.  


The Argent Wolfhound was **strong** , strong enough to give Scott a real fight in reclaiming his shield. They traded quick punches over the top and bottom of it, before the Wolfhound gripped it with both hands and gave the entire thing a terrible wrench to the side. Rather than letting that tear the shield from his hands, Scott went with the momentum, committing to a tightly contained aerial cartwheel around the midpoint of the shield.  


Unfortunately, it didn’t _work_ , because although Scott landed on his feet, the Argent Wolfhound came away with possession of the shield. He held it in guard with his human hand while the metal one reeled back and punched Scott in the sternum so hard that Scott could feel it snap. He flew back what felt like yards and struggled to get back onto his feet, trying to will the broken bone to heal faster.  


The Argent Wolfhound threw the shield at Scott before he’d entirely recovered. It was all Scott could do to duck out of the way. The shield hit the side of a nearby van instead and cut into the metal, coming to a halt more than halfway through.  


Scott charged, and the Argent Wolfhound met him with a blade in hand.  


What followed was the fastest, most brutal hand-to-hand combat Scott had ever experienced. The Argent Wolfhound was fast enough to keep up with him, strong enough not to be overpowered, and exceptionally trained. He flowed between one fighting style and the next as he needed it, never flinching, never faltering. His knife seemed to somehow be in both hands at once, a constant blur of sharp-edged steel. It was all Scott could do to keep parrying the blows with his forearms, waiting for the rare moments where there was a break in the whirlwind of the Wolfhound’s assault so that he could strike with a closed fist or the edges of his claws.  


Their even match was a dead heat. The Wolfhound backed Scott up against a van and Scott kicked out one of his knees to give himself space. When the Wolfhound got Scott on his back and tried to punch a hole through his head with that metal arm, Scott rolled out of the way too quickly and left the Argent Wolfhound with his fist buried three quarters of an inch into the concrete. When the Wolfhound sprang back up to cage Scott in with an unreal flurry of knife attacks, Scott maneuvered them so that he could retrieve his shield. When Scott used that shield to try and catch the Wolfhound in a pain suppression hold, the edge of it jammed into the elbow joint and inner workings of the metal arm, the Argent Wolfhound reached up with his free hand and gouged a wound into the back of Scott’s neck with what felt like _claws_.  


Scott grabbed the Argent Wolfhound by the face and _heaved_ , throwing him over Scott’s body and way. His neoprene facemask came off in Scott’s hand, and Scott immediately dropped it.  


Not that he could say that he’d done _that_ intentionally. The Wolfhound had _done_ something to him with those claws. Scott’s entire body was starting to go shaky and numb. He had less and less control of any of his limbs, like he was being detached from the steering wheel of his own body. It was with an enormous effort that he managed to turn around and face the Argent Wolfhound before he hit the ground with his knees.  


That was when the entire world stopped.  


With the abruptness of a slit throat, Scott couldn’t care any more that his body was slowly responding less and less. He couldn’t care that the city around him was on fire, or that there were more hostiles on the field. He couldn’t care about anything.  


He couldn’t think.  


He couldn’t even _breathe_.  


The Argent Wolfhound was standing right in front of him, unmasked.  


The Argent Wolfhound was about to kill him.  


The Argent Wolfhound was _**Stiles**_.

  
  



	48. Chapter 48

It was the only thing that Scott could think. His body was seemingly shutting down, he was slowly crumpling face-first onto the pavement, and _all_ Scott could even come close to thinking was that _this was Stiles_.  


There was no doubt in his mind. Even unable to hear the Wolfhound’s heartbeat or smell his real scent over the sensory riot that surrounded him, Scott knew. He knew in his _bones_ , this wasn’t a coincidence, or a man who simply _looked_ like Stiles. This **was** Stiles, somehow back from the dead, and on the _wrong side_.  


His voice sounded far too much like a whimper when Scott finally managed to rasp out, astonished and in pain, “... _Stiles_?”  


The voice that answered him had been one Scott had only heard in dreams for so, so long, and even then never like this. Not with this dead, derisive tone. “What the hell is a _Stiles_?”  


Stiles turned, pivoting his body to bring up the arm that had been hanging behind him. There was a pistol in it, and for a flash of a second, Scott felt _relief_. It would be the merciful ending, better than lying here, unable to move, unable to look way from this _thing_ that should not be _able_ to be.  


In the next second-flash, Mason came streaking down out of the sky on the wings of his technological marvel and punted Stiles to the ground.  


Stiles rolled for several feet and then popped back up again, with _another_ pistol he’d pulled from somewhere. That, too, he aimed directly at Scott, but there wasn’t time for him to pull the trigger before a rocket screamed over Scott’s head, fired from somewhere out of his line of sight. It hit the truck Stiles was standing next to and exploded.  


Somewhere in the rain of fire that resulted, between one piece of falling debris and the next, Stiles shimmered and then disappeared.  


By the time the wreckage from the rocket had quieted, so had the symphony of discord that Stiles had been somehow surrounded by. Everything seemed so quiet. Somewhere in the near distance, Scott could hear the sirens of emergency vehicles, getting closer.  


They arrived out of sight for Scott, but he knew who they were. It wasn’t going to be the regular police force responding to this. The agents who came spilling out of the trucks behind him, demanding that Allison and Mason put their hands on their heads and get on their knees, would be S.H.I.E.L.D. Scott was fairly certain he even recognized Ennis’ voice and scent through it all.  


Someone approached Scott from behind and leaned down over him, touching the back of his neck. It was the voice of one of the members of the Wolf Squad that spoke up, near enough that Scott was sure he would have flinched if he’d been _able_ to flinch. “Kanima venom. Looks like the Wolfhound got ‘im. Should I finish the job?”  


“No.” Ennis replied from _somewhere_. “Too many witnesses. We take them somewhere private to take care of this. Get him in the van.”  


The hands that picked Scott up were not gentle. They lifted him as if he were nothing more than a sack of potatoes and shoved him into the back of the van where they’d already put Mason and Allison. It was up to _them_ to help Scott sit up on the bench in the van, rather than sprawled motionless over the floor.  


As soon as he was sat up, leaning back against the van wall with his chin tipped up and his throat on far too much display, Scott rolled his eyes to the side until he could make eye contact with Allison. “It was _him_.”  


“What?” Allison asked, her voice low and urgent, as she reached to try and readjust the way Scott’s head fell back against the wall.  


“It was _him_ , Allison. It was _Stiles_. I’m _sure_ of it. I saw his face and it was _him_.” Scott was vaguely aware that he was repeating himself, in the same way he was aware that he was somehow strapped to a carousel that was rapidly spinning out of control, going over the same thoughts again and again with increasing urgency.  


Mason leaned in from across the wall, expression concerned. “Stiles? Stiles _Stilinski?_ Your right-hand man, who helped you rescue the Howling Commandos from behind enemy lines? How could it possibly be him? It’s been _seventy years_ , Cap.”  


At first, Scott didn’t have an answer for that other than his utter, bone-deep certainty that it was _true_. He closed his eyes, considering the problem, and the solution hit him moments later like an arrow between his brows. “...it’s my fault.”  


“What?” Mason prompted, sounding confused.  


“That mission you just mentioned. Rescuing the Howling Commandos. Stiles was...he was injured, in the process. When we got back to camp, he’d lost a lot of blood. They gave him a transfusion of my blood so he would survive. Talia told me then, she had no idea what it would do to Stiles. It...it must have changed him, somehow. It must have made him...heal better, live longer.” Scott opened his eyes again, panic spearing through him. He could feel himself start to sweat, suddenly, and the back of the van felt far too closed-in. “He must have survived the fall from the train because of _my_ blood, and...and the Argents knew just where to look for him. They must have done their _experiments_ on him, and...and it’s my fault they could do it.”  


“Scott, that’s not--” Allison started, voice rough but attempting comfort.  


“I have to find him.” Scott interrupted, too occupied with the noise inside his own mind to attend to her. “I have to find him, and I have to _save_ him.”  


“Scott--”  


He wanted to _punch_ something, he was full of so many emotions, _too_ many emotions, but he couldn’t move at all. All he could do was interrupt again, voice cracking around his words. “I have to! I _have_ to save him, Allison, you don’t understand! He _needs_ me. _I_ always had _him_. Even when I had _nothing_ , I had _Stiles_!”  


A tense, unhappy silence settled over the back of the van. Allison looked away, and then winced, and it was something in her expression that drew Scott out of his own head enough to realize what his senses were telling him. “...you’re bleeding.”  


“It’s nothing.” Allison dismissed it immediately, making a gesture with her good arm like she was throwing Scott’s concern away.  


Scott didn’t want to leave it at that, and luckily, Mason wouldn’t either. He leaned back in, peering at Allison’s shoulder. He turned to the guards that rode in the van with them, then, hands turned in supplication. “We have to get her to a doctor. She’s lost a lot of blood, and--”  


The guard on the right responded by pulling their electric baton free of their belt.  


Mason and Allison stopped moving, eyes fixed on that baton. In one swift, fluid motion, the guard turned to their partner and jabbed them with the baton, discharging the electricity until the second guard stopped moving.  


Then they reached up to remove their helmet, revealing themselves to be Hayden Romero. She smiled a tight, grim smile at Allison and Scott. “That helmet smelled like old beans anyway.”  


She leaned in towards Scott, producing what looked like an epi-pen from a pocket. She pressed it into the skin of his neck, releasing the medicine inside, and after a sharp prick of pain, Scott realized he was rapidly regaining control of his body. A bit unnecessarily, Hayden clarified, “Kanima venom antidote. Give it a minute.”  


Her eyes flicked towards Mason a moment later, and darkened briefly. “Who’s he?”  


“A friend.” Is all Scott responded with, closing his eyes briefly as his body came back online. It was pins and needles over every inch of his skin, and while he could endure it, the sensation made him kind of want to scream.  


Luckily, Allison still had some amount of focus. “Romero. How are we getting out of here? Please tell me you have a plan.”  


“I do.” Hayden confirmed, pulling another tool out of her apparently unending arsenal. “It’s not gonna be pretty, and it’s not gonna be comfortable, but it’ll get us out of here. I’ve got a safehouse that isn’t compromised, but we have to move fast.”  


“We can do fast.” Mason promised, shifting positions to help support Allison on her wounded side. Scott slid off of the bench and to his feet, wobbling once before giving Hayden a nod. He wasn’t at his best--but he could do fast and not pretty if he had to.  


Hayden nodded, and leaned down to press her tool to the floor of the van. In a matter of seconds, it had burnt an enormous hole in the floor, big enough for them to escape out of as long as they were so, _so_ painfully careful.

  
She looked back up, her dark eyes alight with something like a sense of manic glee. “Alright, gang. Down the rabbit hole.”


	49. Chapter 49

They managed to extract from the S.H.I.E.L.D. convoy without further injury or getting caught, which honestly felt like some kind of divine miracle to Scott. Hayden wasted no time in getting them to the safehouse she’d promised was set up. By the time they entered it, Scott was supporting Allison with her arm over his shoulders, mostly carrying her. Mason moved ahead of them, calling out, “We need a doctor, she’s been shot and lost a lot of blood!”  


One of the attendants in the safehouse immediately rushed to Scott, helping to support Allison. Hayden spoke from behind them, her voice pure authority. “Take her to _his_ room. She’ll want to see him. They’ll all want to see him.”  


The attendant nodded, and started to help Allison deeper into the safehouse. Scott and Mason followed behind, exhausted and wary.  


Neither of those things made it easier to handle the fact that they entered the room that Allison was going to be treated in just to find Alan Deaton sitting up in a hospital bed, very much alive if not well.  


Shock, anger, betrayal and confusion all roiled up from the pit of Scott’s stomach, suddenly. He couldn’t move, didn’t know what to say, totally knocked sideways by this revelation when he was already reeling from the realization that _Stiles was alive_. He stammered a few moments, before finally managing to choke out a single word. “ _What?_ ”  


“I’m sure you’re surprised.” Deaton started, his voice weary and strained.  


“I think that’s _understating it_ a bit.” Allison cut in from where she’d  been settled into the corner, trying to submit to having her wound treated despite how angry she seemed to be.  


Deaton didn’t even have the grace to look chagrined. He just looked as calm and intractable as he’d always looked as he launched into his explanation. “I didn’t get out of that without some serious injury. We used a special venom to slow my heartbeat enough to fool the medical team. In order to draw out the compromised members of S.H.I.E.L.D., the assassination attempt had to look successful.”  


“And you couldn’t have at least told _us_?” Scott growled, finding himself flexing and unflexing his hands repeatedly.  


Hayden, at least, had the grace to sound apologetic as she explained, “We couldn’t be sure _you_ weren’t compromised. We couldn’t afford to take any chances.”  


Allison flinched a little under the touch of the medical attendant treating her wound, but her eyes lifted to focus their sharp anger on Hayden and Deaton rather than the medic. “Yeah, so what was your _conclusion_?”  


“That you three are just about the only people who have a chance of saving the lives of thousands, if not millions, of innocents.” Deaton answered, his tone finally creeping into grim determination rather than that calm facade he constantly exuded.  


Deaton was right. Scott knew they had to focus, to push past their sense of personal offense or betrayal and at least work to stop the Argents’ plan. He leaned forward, scraping his hands over his face before finally coming back around to speech again. “Alexander Deucalion is going to launch Project Insight and use it to kill anyone he deems a ‘supernatural’. Except those working for him, of course.”  


“We need to stop that launch from happening.” Hayden said, glancing to the others in the room as if looking for input.  


Deaton’s head shook. “At this point, we’d need clearance from the World Security Council to stop the launch, and that’s not going to happen, especially as they believe I’m dead. Even if they aren’t aware of what’s going on, they think the project is being used to prevent terrorism.”  


“Which is exactly why we don’t _design_ helicarriers that can _globally target_ people by their _DNA_ and _murder them from space_!” He wasn’t _trying_ to shout, but the words came out of Scott with too much intensity to be anything _but_.  


Somehow, Deaton just slid right past his objection as if it hadn’t happened. “We can’t stop the launch, but we _can_ recalibrate their targeting. We can assume anyone left on those helicarriers is sympathetic to the Argent cause. If we recalibrate them to target _themselves_ , we can eliminate a lot of birds with one stone.”  


Scott had to swallow another growl, his back teeth gritted together. “ _People_ , you mean. People. Not birds.”  


“Fascists, Scott. They’re fascists trying to commit a genocide. This is literally what you signed up to fight in the first place.” Mason finally spoke, voice weary and gentle.  


“We’re going to tear it all down. _All of it_. But if anyone surrenders to us, we’re going to give them a chance. Not a chance to do it again, but a chance to prove they weren’t complicit in this, a chance for redemption. Not all of them could be involved in this, and some of them might not have any _choice_ in it.” The words came like a declaration, not a suggestion, or something Scott wanted to _suggest_ as something they _might_ do. They were a _command_ , and Scott wasn’t going to stomach them being anything else.  


Everyone else knew it, too. Everyone else accepted it, because everyone else knew who he was _actually_ talking about.  


After that, Scott found the room felt too closed-in, stifling with the scents of blood and resentment and fear. He barely muttered an apology before he stood and shoved his way out of the room.  


He ended up going all the way out of the safehouse entirely. There was a small creek outside, water tripping over the stones in a way that was likely only noisy to Scott’s ears alone. A small wooden bridge stretched over it, and Scott found himself pausing halfway across it, turning to look out over the water and lean on the railing.  


He could remember, in a time so, so far away, crossing a similar bridge with Stiles. It had been right after the funeral for Scott’s mother, leading them away from the small cemetery where she’d been buried, in a plot barely better than an anonymous one. He could remember how crushed and tiny he’d felt, how hollowed-out and useless, like everything that had made him a worthwhile man had been torn out of him and stuffed into the ground to pad his mother’s coffin.

He could remember how it was only the feel of Stiles’ hand on his shoulder that had swung him back to reality, squeezing the small bones together just a little. “Hey. You know you don’t have to stay in that house alone, right?”  


Scott remembered smiling up at Stiles; an echo of that smile ghosted across his face now. He remembered feeling scraped-out and refilled with pain, but trying not to worry Stiles _anyway_. “It’s okay, Stiles, it’s my home.”  


“It’s not your _only_ home.” Stiles had said, voice serious, _face_ serious in a way it frequently wasn’t. “I’m just saying. We can put a mattress on the floor, like when we were kids. You don’t have to be alone. You _aren’t_ alone. I’m with you ‘til the end of the line.”  


Scott squeezed his eyes shut and tried not to remember any more.  


He was aware that Mason had joined him on the bridge only a few moments before Mason actually spoke. He had the tone of voice of a man worried he was about to step on a landmine with what he was about to say. “You know he’s going to be there.”  


“Yeah.” Scott didn’t want to talk about this. He knew they were going to talk about it anyway.  


“He might not surrender, Scott. You know that, right? You might have to take him out.” Mason still sounded like he was talking to a voice-activated time-bomb. He might not have been wrong.  


Scott’s head shook. “I’m not going to take him out, Mason. He’s my best friend.”  


“He doesn’t even _know_ you.”  


There, Scott shoved himself up to stand straight. He turned away from the handrailing and instead leveled his eyes on Mason, as determined and dominant as he’d ever been. There would be no denying the truth he spoke, no ignoring it. Scott would allow no other reality. “He’s my _best friend_. You don’t understand what it was like, for us. He’ll _know_ me.”  


Scott started to brush past Mason on his way back into the safehouse to prepare. He was three steps past him, and no more, when he turned over his shoulder to reiterate himself.

  
“He might not know _himself_ , but he’ll know _me_.”


	50. Chapter 50

Hayden still had the quinjet that she’d flown down from New York in. After the most perfunctory of preparations, Scott and Mason and Hayden piled into it, grim-faced and quiet. Allison had assured Scott she had her own infiltration plan, and that she’d  _ be there _ to help the operation. Scott could remember all too vividly how she hadn’t at all been where she’d been meant to be at the end of the  _ Lemurian Star _ mission, but at this point he had no option but to trust her. They were too far in and had too few people on their side for him to consider any alternative.

The area around Triskelion was abuzz with activity as they prepared for the launch of the helicarriers. It made it easy for their quinjet to slide into the landing pattern, for Hayden to radio their credentials to the control tower in the most bored, unimpressed tone he’d ever heard a human being use. It seemed to be a common enough theme amongst the pilots requesting landing privileges, because the traffic control personnel didn’t flinch once in giving her the clearance to come into the quinjet bay at the Triskelion.

They did a lot more flinching when they opened the door to do post-flight checks and were confronted with Mason and Hayden’s drawn guns.

Slowly, the S.H.I.E.L.D. agents retreated into the control room, and the trio advanced, Hayden, then Mason, then Scott last of all. He could see the shock roll over the faces of the agents in stages, as the Falcon and then Captain America strode right into the hive of the enemy without hesitation. Scott couldn’t afford to show any weakness.

He walked straight to the control panel for the traffic control officers, and leaned in, smiling at the agent who scuttled out of the way. “Excuse me. I’ll just be a moment.”

Thankfully, neither the man who had been stationed at the panel nor any of the others in the room seemed interested in actually interrupting Scott, or preventing what he wanted to do. It gave Scott a small kernel of hope, hot and high in his chest. Maybe some of S.H.I.E.L.D’s personnel could be saved, even if the organization had to be put on the funeral pyre.

He thumbed and flipped a few switches, until he was satisfied that he was speaking over the intercom to the entire Triskelion building. Scott took a deep breath in to steady himself before he switched the feed to live and began to speak.

“Uh, hello. Hello, S.H.I.E.L.D. This is Scott McCall. I know that recently you’ve been told that I’m a renegade or I’ve gone AWOL or that I don’t care about protecting my country any more. I’m telling you that nothing could be more wrong. I care. I care  _ so much _ . And I believe that most of you are here because  _ you _ care about those things, too. So, uh. That’s why I came back. Because it’s important for you to know, for  _ all _ of you to know, that S.H.I.E.L.D. has been taken over by the Argents. They’re fascists. They’re  _ Nazis _ . They’re literally everything I spent fighting during the War, and now they’ve infiltrated S.H.I.E.L.D. They’re planning on using Project Insight to commit a genocide against innocent people. I’m going to stop them. If you believe in standing against fascism and the slaughter of innocents, stand with me now and  _ help _ me. Otherwise--this is your one warning.  _ Stay out of my way _ .”

Scott leaned back from the panel and made a sweeping gesture to the agents he’d displaced, as if to invite them to go back to their tasks. He was pleased to see that none of them chose to do so, instead crowding near the back of the room to discuss what he’d just said over the intercom. He turned towards Hayden and Mason with a grim expression on his face. “We have to get to that launch bay. We have to assume that my speech isn’t going to stop anything.”

“It was a pretty good speech, though.” Mason encouraged, picking up into a slow jog to keep up with Scott. “Did you rehearse it?”

The very  _ idea _ of having rehearsed it made Scott laugh, a sudden and somewhat uncomfortable sound. “...no. Definitely not.”

Hayden peeled off shortly thereafter, to go assist Allison with her own infiltration plan. There was little further banter as they made their way down to the larger launch bay where the helicarriers were waiting. The further they went, the greater the tension in the air became. As they entered the bay itself, the helicarriers looming in the vast open space of it like great, terrible birds of prey, that tension snapped.

Alarms started shrieking, bouncing off of the metal and doubling in on themselves, a cacophony that made Scott’s head start to spin. Agents poured out of almost every door, some of them moving to intercept Scott and Mason, some of them moving to intercede against their own comrades. Scott and Mason immediately started to sprint, Scott in front with his shield raised up in front of them.

“You think they know we’re coming?” Mason asked, wry, as they started to advance down the docks to the helicarriers.

It was another question Scott could only meet with a dry bark of a laugh.

Moments later, the Argent S.H.I.E.L.D. agents opened fire on Scott, Mason, and their allies.

Scott gestured over his head to the second of the three helicarriers, and immediately heard Mason’s wing array whine to life. Mason skimmed over Scott’s head seconds later, already ramping up to moving at speed and pirouetting through the bullet spray with deceptive grace. Scott almost wished he could stop and watch Mason fly, but there was too much at stake for him to stop for an instant. That would just have to come later.

Provided there was a later.

He dropped his shoulder and started to sprint behind his shield, as if he were charging a door to batter it down with his own body. Bullets sparked off of the front of the shield, fountaining around him, and Scott ignored them all in the push to get onboard the Alpha carrier.

He managed to force his way in through the door just before it was sealed for take-off, slamming his shield to the side so that he could catch the head of a hapless Argent soldier between it and the nearest wall. Scott kicked the guy’s gun out of his reach and immediately started scrambling his way down through the guts of the helicarrier to the servers housing the targeting arrays. On every level, he met resistance, although in some places that resistance was already engaged by opposing S.H.I.E.L.D. agents. The urge to go save every person who had put their life on the line for his mission was strong, but Scott had to repress that and keep moving. If he didn’t succeed, any individual victories he’d achieved would mean nothing.

The helicarrier was already in the air by the time he got down the computers. He could see the landscape of Washington DC through the massive windows that surrounded the array, slowly growing broader and smaller as they rose. Outside, the muffled sounds of anti-aircraft fire told him that Mason was hard at work infiltrating the Bravo carrier. Romero’s voice cracked in through the com in his ear. “Target acquisition happens at three thousand feet, Cap.”

“We’re on it, Romero.” He replied, sprinting along the walkway to the center console.

Scott skidded to a stop, eyes darting over every part of machine until he figured out how to access it. Inside were rows and rows of identical green chips, all the size of maybe half a playing card, no more. Luckily, Deaton had given them detailed instructions over which chip to replace. Scott counted six back on the bottom row and used one hand to snatch the previous targeting chip out of its housing. The other hand slammed their replacement into place. “Alpha locked.”

Moments later, Mason’s voice added, “Bravo locked.”

Almost as soon as Mason had said the words, a pneumatic door hissed behind Scott. He spun on his heels to realize there was another elevator leading down to this level, and that a handful of angry soldiers were on their way out of it, weapons drawn.

A quick, frantic look around the area told Scott in short order that there really was nowhere to go but  _ down _ . “Mason! I need your help! Below Carrier Alpha in like...forty seconds!”

“Acknowledged, en route!”

Scott took a deep breath, fitted all of his faith in Mason’s speed and accuracy, and jumped off of the catwalk.

He plummeted through the air and hit the glass enclosure below him with both feet, going at speed. He crashed right through it, showered with shards of broken window and the Argent lackeys firing in his wake. He fell past the bulk of the helicarrier and into the open space above Washington D.C. Above him, the fight still raged, machine gun fire and anti-aircraft cannons percussing at different pitches. There was a rhythm to it all that was all too familiar, a dangerous lull like the beat of deadly waves against a rocky shore.

Scott was shocked right back out of it when Mason collided with him mid-air, hands scrambling to get a grip on him.

Twisting his arms up, Scott managed to get his fingers wrapped around one of Mason’s forearms and  _ hang on _ , using as much of his strength as he dared. His downward momentum jerked to a sudden stop, and Scott could hear Mason holler in pain as it pulled too-hard on his shoulder. Desperately grasping onto his shield with his other hand, Scott still tried to get his fingers on bare skin just enough to steal Mason’s pain.

They wobbled in flight, then spun and cartwheeled a dizzy spiral up, finally coming up over the flight deck of Carrier Charlie. Scott’s whole head swam with it, disoriented. He barely got his feet under him when Mason swooped back down to place him on the deck. Without any time to waste, Scott started sprinting again in what  _ felt _ like a straight line, while Mason came to a landing behind him and folded in his wings.

His mind should have cleared as he ran, but instead every step seemed to make it worse. It wasn’t until the dizziness turned to absolute vertigo that Scott realized what was going on.

“Mason, watch--!”

  
Scott only had time for those two short syllables before the Argent Wolfhound materialized out of the air in front of him and used his mechanical arm to throw Scott off of the side of the helicarrier.


	51. Chapter 51

At this point in his life, Scott was almost getting  _ used _ to freefall.

He didn’t panic like he used to, when finding himself in the middle of the sky and plummeting downward. He didn’t know if that was an artifact of having been saved so many times or being exhausted and resigned to the potential outcome if he  _ wasn’t _ , but he didn’t exactly have time to examine that feeling too closely. There were still lives to save.

So instead, Scott twisted in the air, spreading his limbs and then tucking them close like skydiver in an attempt to control the speed and direction of his fall. He managed, somehow, to direct himself back towards the helicarrier, arms outstretched, claws extended.

He hit the bottom edge of the helicarrier claws first and roared as his momentum and the weight of his body dragged them through the metal. He came to a stop perilously close to the edge, both legs dangling over what amounted to an abyss. Above him, Scott could hear Mason and Stiles still engaged in combat.

Despite that, Mason yelled over his headset, voice panicked, “Cap?!”

“I’m still on the helicarrier, Falcon, I’m on my way to the server bay.” Scott wheezed, eyes tearing with the wind as he squinted upwards to where the deck was, far above him.

Hand over laborious hand, Scott started to crawl his way back up the side of the helicarrier, claws piercing deep into the metal with every inch. Every one of those inches brought him closer to the confusing noise that Stiles’ proximity brought to his senses. Scott bit down on his bottom lip and pushed himself to keep going. They couldn’t afford to let even Stiles stop them.

Scott had, incredibly, managed to get about halfway to the glass surrounding the server bay when Mason made a strangled noise and appeared in the air above him. His wings were still deployed, but Mason seemed to have no control, his flight curving downwards into a dangerous drop. It felt like it took far too long for Scott to realize that Mason was trying to speak through the coms again, rasping out the words, “ _K_ _ anima venom! _ ”

He only had seconds to react. Without thinking, Scott bunched his legs beneath him and  _ leapt _ towards Mason.

They slammed together in a football tackle, moving fast. Scott managed to wrench the flight of Mason’s wing pack around to point them straight at the server bay. He gritted his teeth, apologizing to Mason in a low rasp before he growled over the coms, “Falcon is paralyzed and coming in on his parachute. Please extract.”

Shock flashed over Mason’s face, but Scott didn’t have time to explain himself. Instead, as they closed in on the glass of the server bay, he pulled the ripcord on Mason’s chute.

The wings retracted automatically, and Mason’s limp body was pulled backwards by the resistance of the chute, out of the vicinity of the helicarrier and out into open air.

Scott curled up, shield over his head, and went crashing through the wall of windows like a cannonball.

He rebounded off of too many parts of the server cage’s infrastructure, less like a cannonball and more like a  _ pinball _ , giving a cry of pain any time he hit the edge of something too hard and moving too fast. Eventually, Scott managed to stretch out with the hand not clinging to his shield and dig his claws into the metal of the catwalk, dragging himself to a stop like he’d done on the outside of the helicarrier. Just as laboriously, he pulled himself up onto the top of the catwalk entirely.

Once there, Scott panted for breath, trying to clear his head long enough to be sure he could make the sprint from where he was to the servers’ control console. No matter how many precious seconds he wasted, he couldn’t seem to orient himself. Sucking in a noisy breath of air, Scott realized that meant only one thing.

He took a step forward. Stiles materialized out of nothing at the other end of the catwalk, between Scott and the server.

“Stiles,  _ no _ .” Scott breathed through the words, voice raw as he forced it through the unhappy knot wedged in the bottom of his throat. “I have to get to that computer.”

Stiles didn’t react, not to his name nor to the sound of Scott’s voice. He just stood there, stone-faced and implacable.

“Stiles,  _ please! _ ” Scott tried again, a little louder this time, letting the desperation bleed into his tone. “They’re going to kill so many people. Probably you, definitely me,  _ everybody  _ they deem non-essential. I can’t just  _ stand _ here and let that  _ happen _ !”

Stiles still didn’t react.

For just an instant, Scott closed his eyes, feeling the weight of the world press down on his shoulders. It had never let up on him, not even for a minute, but now it felt more heavy than it had ever been.  _ These _ words were nothing more than a whisper. “ _ Please _ don’t make me do this.”

Stiles tipped his chin down, almost imperceptibly. His upper lip curled at once side, just as faint a gesture.

Scott tried not to telegraph it when he sent his shield winging straight at Stiles--no,  _ the Argent Wolfhound _ \--but the Wolfhound still managed to get his metal arm up in time to shield his face. The shield rebounded off of it in a clean arc, making it easy for Scott to catch it and shelter his head and shoulders behind it.

It was just as well he did, because seconds later the Argent Wolfhound had pulled a pair of pistols from his belt and was firing on Scott, the gunshots thunder-loud in the enclosed space. The first several shots rang off of his shield, but Stiles was just as fast as Scott was, now, arguably better-trained, and far more willing to kill. As Scott closed the distance and tried to knock the first gun away, the Wolfhound countered with the other one outside of Scott’s guard, and the bullet ripped through Scott’s side. It left a clean through-and-through wound that burned with the pain of wolfsbane poisoning.

Scott was carrying the antidote, but he had no time for it. He spun again despite the grazing bullet wound, this time getting his body’s entire weight behind it as he slammed the shield into the Argent Wolfhound’s chest. The assassin went flying backwards, skidding at least a foot on his back.

That didn’t slow him down, not nearly enough. The Wolfhound kipped back up to his feet and drew a small knife in one fluid motion, charging Scott with the same aggressive, tight-quarters knifeplay that had overwhelmed him before. It was vicious, brutal,  _ hungry _ , and almost impossible for Scott to keep up with. Every time he thought he’d countered a blow, Stiles had switched the knife to the other hand, come in low with hard kicks to Scott’s knees and ankles. It wasn’t until the Wolfhound swung hard with his left arm that Scott managed to block strongly enough with his shield to push him back a few stumbling feet.

The second he got any time to do it, Scott turned, immediately punching in the command needed to access the chip storage in the targeting array.

They hadn’t even fully finished sliding into view when the Argent Wolfhound came at him again from behind. He had the knife in hand again, and this time when Scott tried to use his shield to block and turn him to the side like before, the Wolfhound was ready for it. He kept his knife hand under the level of the shield, still trying for Scott’s throat, and brought that metal arm up to hold the edge of the shield itself. They held that deadlock for several seconds before Scott shifted his weight back, unbalancing the Wolfhound. He brought one leg up before the assassin could regain  his footing and kicked him hard in the belly, pushing him away again.

Stiles grunted in pain as he rebounded, the first sound he’d made this entire fight.

Again, he lunged in with his knife, and again Scott deflected him. They made several passes like that, Scott blocking the Wolfhound or the Wolfhound blocking him, neither making any progress, until it all seemed to run aground on the Argent Wolfhound’s natural impatience.

He legitimately  _ roared _ with frustration as he charged at Scott this time. Instead of attacking with a weapon, he dropped his shoulder and wrapped his arms around Scott’s waist, pushing them both over the railing of the catwalk.

They landed on an outcropping of metal below the catwalk in a tangle of angry limbs. The Argent Wolfhound squirmed himself free before Scott could get a hold on him, and skidded a few feet along the incline before getting back to his feet. Somewhere in the fall, Scott had lost his shield, but even  _ worse _ , the chip he needed to place in the targeting array had fallen out of his belt pouch. He could see it laying on the metal just beyond Stiles.

By contrast, the Argent Wolfhound clearly hadn’t seen it. Instead, he was charging Scott, growling, arms out and fingers hooked. Scott realized as he closed the space that he had long claws on his human hand, dripping with some kind of slick ichor. It had to be the kanima venom.

He couldn’t let the Wolfhound score a hit on him with those.

Scott let the Argent Wolfhound control the fist-and-claw fight that ensued as they came together, in exchange for being sure he didn’t get kanima venom in his system. They turned in a tight weaving of traded blows, fists and claws and feet and fists again. When they’d turned about halfway around a circle, the Argent Wolfhound reached to throw Scott, and Scott let him.

He landed on the metal outcropping right next to the chip. Scott’s hand closed around it as he slid off of the edge and fell to the glass bottom of the server housing.

Scott rolled off his momentum and had just gotten to his feet when his own shield came at him, fast and hot from just behind him. He could do little more than just take it to the head, collapsing forward as his vision briefly went white-stars. He barely had enough time to roll up into a crouch and stomp his shield up into position before the Wolfhound was firing at him again.

After four rounds, he appeared to run out of bullets, and in the time he took to drop the pistol and draw a knife, Scott threw his shield again.

Like before the Argent Wolfhound deflected the shield to the side. He darted in with his knife and this time Scott couldn’t manage to block him. The thin blade sunk into the soft part of Scott’s shoulder. He dropped the chip in the shock of pain and it skittered across the glass away from him. Immediately, the Argent Wolfhound released him and instead dove for the chip.

With his own low growl, Scott wrenched the knife out of his shoulder and scrambled after the Wolfhound. He felt his eyes blaze red as he grabbed the assassin by the back of his neck and lifted him off of his feet, rattling him like a misbehaving puppy. When that didn’t work, Scott snarled, and reversed their momentum, using the full of his Alpha strength and his weight to fling the Argent Wolfhound to the floor.

Immediately, he had the Wolfhound’s human arm in a pain suppression lock, one palm pressing that too-wild, too-familar face away from him, a knee in the center of his back. With his hand tightly fisted around the chip, the Wolfhound couldn’t use his claws, and with his weight awkwardly supported by his metal arm, he couldn’t free it for long enough to punch Scott with it. Scott hollered, letting the supernatural reverb take over the edges of his voice. “Stiles, drop it! Drop it! I said, drop it!”

Stiles did no such thing. Instead, he fought back, and Scott was forced to wrench too hard on the Wolfhound’s human arm. He could feel it dislocate under his hand, and something terrible lurched through Scott’s chest.

The Argent Wolfhound still fought the grapple for far too long. Scott twisted and held on and ignored the terrible noises the Wolfhound made until Scott could finally get him in a chokehold and knock him out. After what felt like an eternity of trying to hold his position, the body in his arms finally went limp, fingers uncurling around the chip.

Scott let out a shuddering breath and reached down to carefully extract it from all of those envenomed claws.

He could hear Hayden reporting how much time he had left in his ear, but Scott wasn’t paying attention to her. He was already going as fast as he could go, gathering his legs beneath him to jump the distance from where he stood to where he needed to be, to put the chip in place. He landed on the metal outcropping solidly and was halfway to the ladder to the catwalk when another shot rang out.

Pain flared in his left thigh. Scott growled and ignored it, lunging for the ladder and clawing his way up. Just a few rungs from the top, the Argent Wolfhound shot him again, this time in his right arm.

Scott kept going. He only needed one arm for this.

He scrambled to the center console and tore the original chip out of its housing.

A third shot echoed in the enclosed chamber. The fire tore through his gut, this time, and Scott slumped forward against the console as the red stain started to spread over the belly of his uniform. He curled the fingers of his right hand tight, letting his claws dig into his palm. He shut his eyes briefly, breathing heavily.

  
Then he gave one last lurch of movement and slammed the chip into place, rasping over the radio. “...Charlie locked. Fire when ready.”


	52. Chapter 52

Hayden must have been able to track him somehow, because she replied with worry, “But Cap--!” 

Scott cut her off with a shout. “Just do it!” 

She didn’t argue. There wasn’t time to. Instead, Scott realized with some sick kind of relief that he could hear the big guns on the helicarriers realigning to aim at each other. Moments later, they began to fire, mortar shells ripping through glass and metal that surrounded him. 

Scott let himself slump against the console, eyes closed. He’d almost let himself resign to his fate, to the shuddering of the world as it fell apart around him, when a terrible cry of pain echoed up from the floor of the server casing. 

It was Stiles. 

Despite the wolfsbane bullets still in him, despite his exhaustion and his body burning with pain, Scott flung himself to the side of the railing and looked down. On the floor, Stiles lay pinned beneath a massive steel girder that had just previously been supporting the shape of the server casing. His metal arm was trapped and his free arm dislocated, leaving him no leverage to even attempt to free himself with. 

He’d been trying to kill Scott. Scott knew that. He was likely to go back to trying to kill Scott the moment he was free. Scott knew that too. The wisest thing for Scott to do would be to leave him there and to try and find his own way to extricate. 

But just as he knew those things, Scott knew one other, ultimate truth that overshadowed them all: 

He would never leave Stiles behind, ever again. 

Scott tapped into some reserve of strength he didn’t know he had. He jumped over the railing of the catwalk and landed clumsily on the glass beside Stiles. Widening his stance and trying to get as stable as possible in a crashing aircraft, Scott leaned down and wrapped his arms around the metal girder. 

It was heavy. It was heavier, maybe, than anything Scott had ever attempted to lift before, even healthy and rested, without wolfsbane poisoning his system and sapping his strength. Yet, not lifting it would mean leaving Stiles helpless and trapped in the carcass of the helicarrier. _Not lifting it_ wasn’t an option. Scott roared as he hauled upwards. 

Eventually he managed to get it lifted high enough that Stiles could squirm his way out from beneath it. He staggered back to his feet as Scott dropped the girder, looking up with feral eyes. 

This might be the last chance Scott ever got. He wasn’t going to waste it. He extended one hand slowly towards Stiles, the way he might have done to a cornered wild animal, and spoke hoarsely, “You know me.” 

“No, I don’t!” Stiles shouted, lashing out with his metal arm. It was an uncontrolled strike, nothing like the precise killing blows he’d tried to land on Scott a hundred times. 

Scott staggered back a few feet. He didn’t move to close the distance, or strike back. He just struggled to keep his footing, still pleading. “Stiles, you _know_ me. You’ve known me your _whole life_. You have to _fight_ it, Stiles, please!” 

“Stop _calling_ me that!” Stiles lashed out a second time, breaking open the skin on Scott’s jawline and shoving him back again. 

“It’s your _name_.” Scott insisted, stubbornly, breathing hard. “It’s what I called you. What we all called you. Your whole name is Mieczyslaw Szczepan Stilinski--” 

“SHUT _UP_!” Stiles lunged again, knocking Scott close to the broken edge of the falling helicarrier. 

Scott didn’t care. He dropped his shield, didn’t even watch as it clattered off the broken pieces of the floor and fell through to the water below. “I’m not going to fight you, Stiles. You’re my _best friend_.” 

Stiles’ response was an incoherent roar. He charged at Scott, shoulder-checking him again. They ended up on the glass floor, Scott’s head already dangling over the edge. Stiles hit him, then, with that metal arm. He hit him again, and again, over and over, until Scott could feel something snap in his face, in his heart, maybe in his soul. “You’re just a mark, you’re just a mark! You’re my _mission_!” 

Scott knew he couldn’t do this any more. Somehow, it felt right, like this, to go out at the hands of the man he’d failed so utterly, so long ago. He spat blood out of his mouth, past a split lip, long enough to rasp, “So finish your mission. _Do it_ , Stiles. ‘Cause I’m with you ‘til the end of the line.” 

Above him, arm pulled back for another punishing blow, Stiles _froze_. His eyes went wide with shock and something approaching horror, and for the first time since he’d pulled free the neoprene mask, Scott thought he saw a hint of the man he’d known inside this brutal killing machine. 

The glass beneath him gave way, then, and Scott plummeted into another freefall. 

He fell away from consciousness like he fell away from the helicarrier, gradually and as if it were the most natural thing in the world. Scott tried to keep his eyes focused on Stiles for as long as possible. He’d grabbed at the framework of the helicarrier with his metallic arm, and Scott thought maybe he had a decent chance of surviving. That was good. 

Time crumbled into pieces. He was in the air, he was upside-down, he was right side up, he was hitting the water with his back. It closed over him like a funeral shroud and Scott was once again happy to let it. 

Flashes of things kept rolling past his eyes, things Scott no longer had enough thought left to him to make sense of. 

Fire above the river’s surface. A metal hand reaching down for him. Air in his wet lungs, tasting of smoke and blood. Stiles’ face leaning over him, wet and long-haired and _worried_. A hand searching the pockets of his uniform. 

The faint prick of a needle in the side of his neck.

  
Then, finally, darkness.


	53. Chapter 53

Scott woke up in a hospital bed.

Like freefall, this was becoming strangely routine, just familiar enough to itch under the level of his skin. Although, Scott supposed, that itching could just as easily have been the wolfsbane he knew should have been coursing through his veins, killing with a quickness.

Like  _ before _ , Scott wasn’t quite sure how he was alive.

Slowly, he became aware of the room around him, the quiet thrum of machinery keeping him and others alive. More importantly, he became aware of the rasp and thud of someone right next to him, breathing, heart beating, keeping vigil.

Scott stirred, blinking his eyes open, and Mason’s voice said beside him, “On your left.”

He wanted to laugh, but immediately the attempt at doing it made his lungs feel tight and worn out, like they were made of paper mache. It all came out a rustling sigh instead.

“Hey, take it easy, Cap, you’ve had it a little rough the past couple of days. You’ve earned some rest.” Mason reassured him, his smile soft and fond. Scott honestly couldn’t remember the last time anyone had looked at him like that.

Scott managed to find a hand to lift it and rub it over his face, trying to bring himself some sense of focus. “What happened? How did I get here? The last thing I remember is…”

_ Stiles’ face, staring down at him as he fell, a terrible mirror of something that happened nearly a hundred years ago. _

“Somebody found you on the river bank, in the middle of all the helicarrier wreckage.” Mason shrugged, still watching Scott as Scott struggled to find the bed controls and sit up a little bit more. “It looked like somebody--not the somebody that found you, a different somebody--had pulled you out of the river and delivered the wolfsbane antidote to you. The only problem was, you’d had a lot of it put in your system  _ and _ you’d been beat up pretty badly, so you weren’t healing properly. They brought you back here to the VA hospital to recover. Now that you’re awake, you’ll probably be fine in like,  _ an hour _ .”

That seemed unlikely. Scott wasn’t entirely sure he’d ever be  _ fine _ again, or that he ever  _ had _ been fine. It didn’t seem kind to burden Mason with that. He smiled, faintly, and glanced up at Mason after a moment. “Yeah. I probably will be. Gotta thank that wolf serum, right?”

Mason almost laughed, although there was something missing from the sound that Scott couldn’t quite pinpoint. “Maybe. I’m not sure it’s all that blessing that people talk it up to be, but I guess you don’t have any choice now.”

It was the first time that anyone had acknowledged to Scott that maybe having been transformed into a  _ True Alpha _ werewolf wasn’t the  _ best thing _ that had ever happened to him. It was so adroit and unexpected an observation that it felt like it stole the breath right out of Scott’s lungs. He didn’t know how to respond to it, instead just looking up at Mason with wide, shocked eyes.

Mason just smiled, and nodded like he somehow understood what Scott was feeling. He didn’t press against it, or push too far. He just kind of slid past it, having noted Scott’s reaction, and instead asked in his same calm, soft tone, “So S.H.I.E.L.D. kind of fell apart completely while you were asleep. And, no, before you get too worried, you were only out for about a day. It fell apart fast. I think that might have had something to do with Black Widow spilling all of their dirty secrets onto the internet. But the real point is, you’re a free man now, Scott McCall. What do you think  you’re going to do, without S.H.I.E.L.D. breathing down your neck?”

A dizzy sense of vertigo added itself to Scott’s shortness of breath. He blinked blankly at Mason and then tore his gaze away to stare at his own knees, under the hospital blanket. Mason was  _ right _ . For the first time for as long as Scott could remember, he didn’t have anyone guiding his actions, not his mother, not the army, not S.H.I.E.L.D., not even  _ Stiles _ \--

The vertigo suddenly snapped into place, the spinning shuddering to a halt centered around the image of Stiles’ face.

This wasn’t the freefall that had gotten so familiar. This was a trajectory, a path Scott had to follow, possibly his only chance at feeling like anything was truly normal and under his control. He knew those things were both so, so far away, but for the first time, Scott felt like he could catch even the slightest amount of their scent on the wind.

He nodded to himself and finally lifted his face to look Mason straight in the eyes again. “I’m going to go find him.”

There was no need for either of them to articulate who  _ him _ was. Instead, Mason weighed the words and ended up pursing his lips around Scott’s conclusion like he was tasting the flavor of it. “...Okay. I’m coming with you.”

Scott’s whole body flushed with shock. He searched every inch of Mason’s expression, but nothing he could find indicated it was some kind of joke or tease. He saw nothing of the sort, just the same earnest kindness that Mason had shown him from the beginning. It  _ still _ felt foreign. “Mason, you don’t...you don’t need to do that. This isn’t your search.”

“Maybe, but I can’t exactly let you go flying out into the unknown without a wingman. Especially not if you’re going after somebody who’s made a couple lifetimes out of knowing how to disappear.” Mason shrugged, unconcerned about the commitment he’d just offered to Scott. “Besides, that mess with S.H.I.E.L.D. hasn’t exactly made it easy to go back to work at the VA.”

It felt a little wrong to laugh, but Scott found himself doing it anyway. Part of him wanted to refuse the offer, too aware of what happened the  _ last _ time anyone had followed him into danger. Part of him was just exhausted, and the idea of trying to continue on alone made something in his shoulders and his chest tremble. He liked Mason. He was comfortable in Mason’s presence. If Mason wanted to help him in his quest to find Stiles, Scott couldn’t bring himself to refuse the company. “Well...we’re gonna need a car.”

  
Mason leaned back in his chair, face brightening as he laughed. He reached out to touch Scott on the forearm, giving him a reassuring pat. “ _ That _ , I can definitely help with.”


	54. Chapter 54

They’d been on the road for  _ months _ .

Some days, Scott felt like it had been much longer. Some days, it felt like it hadn’t been any time at all. Mostly, Scott felt like he’d lost all track of time entirely, like time was an illusion, a lie other people had told him in an attempt to shackle him with it.

It was probably all this time on the move that made him start thinking like that.

As it turned out, chasing a ghost was  _ difficult _ , to say the least. Mason hadn’t been wrong on that. Most people in the shattered remains of the intelligence community didn’t believe that the Argent Wolfhound had ever existed. Those who did were unwilling to say much of anything, like he were some kind of boogie man who could be summoned just by the sound of his name.

Scott only wished it was that simple. He could say Stiles’ name until his voice went hoarse, if that’s what it took.

Once or twice, it had felt like getting close. There’d been a hint of a scent,  _ one time _ , which was more than Scott had ever gotten even when faced with Stiles directly, more than he’d sensed even with him just  _ feet _ away, staring at him through the mask of everything that had turned him into the  _ Argent Wolfhound _ . Scott had nearly pushed himself to collapse trying to chase that scent, for no real gain. It disappeared as soon as it appeared, and it had been three weeks before they’d found  _ anything _ even remotely worth investigating.

Now they were in Miami. Mason had alluded, more than once, that maybe they should take a  _ break _ , enjoy the good weather and the location before moving out of the country on their never-ending trek. Scott had tried, he  _ really had _ , but relaxation was a skill he’d never really had any time to practice. He could see the ocean from the patio of the restaurant they were seated at, hear the waves and feel the salt spray on his skin in a way Scott wasn’t sure others could even experience, and yet none of it was a comfort.

All he could think of was how Stiles was  _ out there _ somewhere, maybe not even capable of remembering exactly who he was. Stiles was out there,  _ needing his help _ , and Scott couldn’t find him.

Across the table, Mason raised his glass of iced tea and swirled it in one hand until the ice rattled, drawing Scott’s attention. Even behind his sunglasses, Scott could sense the fondness that accompanied Mason’s little smirk. “You are  _ really _ bad at downtime, you know that, boss?”

“I’m not your  _ boss _ .” Scott sighed, the response reflexive, as it had become after so many passes between them. “...but yeah. I mean. I can’t argue with that one. I just keep thinking--”

“Well,  _ there’s _ your problem right  _ ther _ e.” Mason laughed a little, sweeping his eyes out towards the ocean. “I know you’re worried, Scott. But Stiles has survived a long, long time on his own. He can probably survive long enough for you to make sure you’re not delirious from sleep deprivation once you finally find him. You don’t want your big reunion to involve you drooling and nodding off halfway through it, right?”

With a snort that could have almost been a laugh, in a different world, Scott shook his head. “I’m not going to  _ nod off _ when I find him. I won’t be  _ able _ to, trust me. There will be way too much adrenaline in my system for that.”

On the table beside him, Scott’s phone vibrated a silent alert. He turned to it, frowning, only to frown more deeply when he realized the text was from a dummy account that he knew to belong to Hayden Romero. The text was simple.

_ We found it _ .

He didn’t need to ask what  _ it _ was. Since S.H.I.E.L.D. had collapsed under the weight of its own internalized parasite, they’d been searching for what had become of Loki’s scepter. It’d been as long a search as Scott’s desperate chase of Stiles’ trail had been, and while Scott was  _ extremely _ pleased to know it had been located, he had this sinking feeling centered in his chest that having  _ found _ it wasn’t enough.

That was confirmed when a second text came in, moments later.  _ We need you for retrieval _ .

Mason set his tea down on the table, his gentle teasing fading as he read the expression on Scott’s face. “Not good news, Cap?”

Scott kept frowning at his phone. He would have to respond, one way or another. He could feel the pull to duty, tugging him in the opposite direction as the pull of his need to find  _ Stiles _ . “...the Avengers are calling.”

An understanding, sympathetic noise preceded Mason’s words. “The world’s never quite  _ saved _ , is it?”

“No. It never is.” Scott agreed grimly, his fingertips tapping the table near to his phone. “There’s always somebody who needs our help.”

“But you’re still thinking about Stiles.”

He was  _ always _ thinking about Stiles. That had been a little bit true before, but since Scott had  _ seen _ him, since Scott had discovered Stiles was somehow, still impossibly  _ alive _ , it seemed like every thought had Stiles’ face haunting the background of it. He nodded without looking up from his phone screen. “I’d have to stop looking for him to help out with this. Who knows how long it would take, how much time I’d lose. He could get so far away while I wasn’t looking for him.”

Mason nodded, listening to Scott’s anxiety and worries without interrupting. Then he offered, as if the offer was just so  _ easy _ and  _ reasonable _ , something anyone would offer, “What if I kept looking for him while you did your superhero thing?”

Scott’s whole body jolted with his surprise. He blinked rapidly as he brought his eyes back up to Mason’s face, searching with all of his senses to gauge how earnest an offer it was. “Are you  _ serious _ ? This...you don’t  _ know _ Stiles, this isn’t your search, or your fight, or...or…”

With a wave of one hand, Mason shook off Scott’s astonished objections. “It’s okay. I like doing the research. I like  _ helping _ . I’ve got some resources, and I’ve got friends I can call. I have as much of a chance to find him as you do, and it isn’t like I can go do what you do with the Avengers. I know you want to help the world. But if I don’t do it, who’s going to help  _ you _ ?”

The words stirred in his head, echoing off of its insides, like many of the things that Mason said. Scott’s chest still felt tight, his whole face reflecting just how touched he was. “Mason, I can’t...I can’t ask you to do this.”

“I know, which is why you  _ didn’t _ . I’m  _ offering _ . I’m not saying I’m going to confront the guy.  _ That’s _ your mess to deal with. But I’ll keep trying to find him. I’ll do my best to stay on the scent until you get back. The world needs Captain America, which means Captain America must have  _ his _ needs met. Besides. Gives you something to look forward to after the mission’s over.” Mason’s smile was small, reserved compared to many of his other smiles.

Scott knew why. He knew what Mason was really doing--giving Scott a reason  _ to _ come back from this mission at all.

He closed his eyes briefly, took in a long, deep breath of the ocean air. As was frequently the case, Mason was right. The Avengers  _ needed _ Scott, and no matter what his personal needs were, Scott couldn’t justify letting something as dangerous as Loki’s scepter remain in the hands of people who might potentially use it for evil. If Mason wanted to continue trying to follow the Argent Wolfhound while Scott was gone, Scott couldn’t force Mason  _ not _ to.

He didn’t  _ want _ to force him not to.

Scott opened his eyes again. “...okay. Okay. I...thank you, Mason. I’ll...I’ll find some way to make this up to you, I swear.”

Lifting his tea back to his mouth, Mason took enough time to quirk a little smile. “I believe you. You won’t  _ have _ to. But I believe you will anyway.”

Scott kept nodding. He  _ would _ . There was no way he could ever let such a kindness go unrewarded. He turned his eyes down to his phone, pressing his thumbprint against the face of it to unlock it. Taking a deep breath, he squared himself, and typed back his reply to Hayden.

_ Will leave for rendezvous point ASAP. Send intel. _


	55. Chapter 55

The Avengers picked Scott up already armed for the proverbial bear. 

The quinjet was crowded, full of Avengers, their gear, and for whatever reason, a pair of compact motorcycles lashed down in the cargo area. Liam looked nervous and uncomfortable, but the others all seemed to be in various states of neutrality, if not good cheer. Malia’s smile as Scott entered was downright radiant. 

“Did you find your lost brother?“ She asked, before anyone had a chance to start anything resembling a briefing. 

“He’s not my brother.” Scott responded with more steel in his voice than even he expected, wincing in apology immediately after. “At least, not by blood. But he is my best friend, and I’m going to find him. I haven’t yet...but Mason’s still looking. I know we’ll find him eventually.” 

Sympathy passed over Malia’s face, but she was cut off by Hayden before she could say anything about it. “Unfortunately, we’re not here to discuss the matter of the Argent Wolfhound.” 

Hayden stepped forward into the most available space inside the quinjet, turning briefly to look each Avenger in the face before she continued. “We’re here because our intelligence finally tracked down Loki’s scepter. It’s being held by Sebastian Valet, a known collaborator and researcher for the Argent organization. We haven’t been able to determine what exactly he’s been trying to use it for, but given the power we know that scepter holds, there’s no answer that could be a good one.” 

Sprawling in one of the quinjet’s corners with his bow leaned up against his legs, Isaac gave a low, unimpressed grunt. “So our objective is to go in there and take the scepter from Valet before he can use it to mess with anyone else’s head.” 

“By any means necessary.” Hayden’s voice was hard and unrelenting. “We can’t afford to let that scepter stay in Argent hands. If it’s not possible to take Valet into custody, then he must be eliminated.” 

Something flipped in Scott’s stomach at the idea. He knew Hayden was right, and yet every time they came to this same conclusion, it roiled in him. The necessity of what must be done to protect the innocent always made him itch, like the scent of wolfsbane on a far-away wind. 

The rumble of the quinjet engines changed timber, and Hayden looked over her shoulder at the pilot for a brief second. “We’re coming into a secluded fortress hidden in the Swiss Alps, where Valet has made his stronghold. Expect heavy resistance, and whatever prototypes Valet has already made with the scepter.” 

“So nothing new, then.” Derek’s tone was dry and deeply unamused. 

Allison gave him a crooked smile that was almost scolding, and turned her attention to Scott. “Hawkeye and I will take one of the bikes. You take the other. The faster we can get into that stronghold and get the scepter, the better. The quinjet will withdraw until you’ve captured the scepter or called for extraction.” 

And the faster Scott could get back to looking for Stiles, Scott did _not_ add.  

The quinjet touched down without any further conversation. The bay door lowered to reveal a sparse forest in the doldrums of winter, covered in a thin patina of snow and devoid of leaves. In the near distance, Scott could hear men shouting in French, their tones indicating alarm. This wasn’t going to be a sneak attack. 

Derek reached up to pull the faceplate of his armor down into place. It was time to go to work. 

Scott tore out of the back of the quinjet on one of the motorcycles, after the others had cleared the way. He opened up the throttle completely, tearing through the trees at a speed that would have been deadly for anyone without the reflexes and senses of an Alpha Werewolf. He still didn’t keep up with half of the team, but it was _fast enough_ , all things being considered. 

As he narrowed in on the base, Scott could hear gunfire spit in erratic bursts and the forlorn wail of a siren that reminded him a lot of the air raid sirens from _The War_. He’d just jumped the bike over a fallen tree and into the first group of Argent soldiers he’d found when Derek’s voice came in over the coms, a low frustrated growl. “Shit!”  

“Shit?” Scott echoed, flinging his shield at a perfect trajectory to bounce it off of each individual head in the small cohort of men only to catch it on the rebound as he continued past them. “What’s shit?” 

“There’s some kind of energy shield protecting the main base. It looks like the shield that protected the tesseract when Loki tried to invade New York.” The voice that responded wasn’t Derek’s, but rather the far more gentle tones of his AI assistant, Kira. “It’s not as strong, though. There’s an underground passage on the north side of the bunker that houses the projection unit. Take that out and the shield should go down too.” 

“Getting to the northern side of the bunker is a lot easier said than done, Kira.” Iron Wolf almost sounded like he was scolding her. 

It wasn’t like Kira had done anything wrong. Scott frowned his way through the next batch of enemies, barely noticing they had even been his way, and made a point to counteract Derek’s surly nature as he spoke. “ _Thank you_ , Kira. Hulk, if you could clear Iron Wolf a path to the north bunker?” 

The answer didn’t come over the coms, but rather in the form of a primal sound, half a roar and half a howl, from deep within the woods. 

Scott moved closer and ever closer to the bunker, interlacing his path with the path of Black Widow and Hawkeye on the other bike. They moved through the opposing soldiers almost as if those soldier weren’t _there_ ; none of them were a match for the skills and prowess of even the least-superpowered members of the team. It wasn’t exactly a matter of making mincemeat, but it was 

They had just clawed their way to the barrier of the shield when Kira spoke again, this time more urgently. “Guys, they’re using mortars! The town is taking fire!” 

“We’re almost to the shield generator! If we withdraw now, we’ll be giving the Argents a chance to escape with that scepter and do _terrible things_ with it, we can’t let that happen!” There was tension in Allison’s voice that spoke of more than just the combat.  

Scott growled to himself, unsettled and impatient, still trying fruitlessly to _disable_ more men than he destroyed. “We can’t just let innocent civilians _die_ because we need this scepter! We have to _help_!”  

Iron Wolf cut off the end of Scott’s protest with a commanding tone. “I’ve got this! Kira, send in the Iron Pack, have them evacuate the citizenry and protect them. We stay here and secure that scepter.” 

“Deploying the Iron Pack, Derek. ETA to the town, five minutes or less.” Kira acknowledged, altogether too cheerful. 

It wasn’t a perfect solution, but it was better than nothing, and Scott didn’t have a better idea _anyway_. “Okay. Let’s do this quick so we can keep those people as safe as we can.”  

The Hulk came bounding in from the forest line, running half like a wolf and half like an ape, green fur all but impervious to the bullets that rained down on him. The attention of almost every soldier in the area diverted their attentions to him. Thor waded in beside the Hulk moments later, leaving Scott and Hawkeye and Black Widow to skirt the perimeter, mopping up the stragglers in an attempt to give Iron Wolf as much time as possible to take down the shield. 

It didn’t take long. No one had prepared the Argent forces for the type of onslaught that the Avengers could bring to bear. They fell back like soft grass in a storm, Iron Wolf’s voice claiming after what only felt like moments, “There! The shield’s down!” 

Scott turned his bike nearly sideways, skidding through the snow and detritus on the forest floor, and reversed direction to return to the bunker and press the assault. 

Fifteen seconds after he’d righted himself again, something hit him broadside with the force of a speeding truck. 

The motorcycle all but melted away beneath him, shattering into too many disparate pieces under the force it was hit with. Scott himself was flung far to the side, suddenly hurtling through the air without any way to control his fall. 

He was hit twice more by whatever it was before he even hit the ground. The second and third blows shattered ribs on both sides of his chest. Pain flared through Scott’s whole body as he half-rolled and half-slid to a stop, back jammed against a cold tree. 

The wind that had assaulted him _laughed_ as it sped away again.  

Scott’s voice rasped in his throat uselessly before he could finally find the wherewithal to open the coms in warning. “Th...there’s a metahuman on the field.”


	56. Chapter 56

Scott didn’t have any time to catch his breath, no matter how desperately he needed it. His ribs hadn’t even finished knitting themselves together when he lurched back to his feet, blinking his eyes until they cleared.

Hawkeye staticked in over the coms. “A metahuman? What kind? What did they look like? Can you give us any intel?”

“They’re fast.” Scott wheezed, trying to force himself to start moving. “That’s all I’ve got. They hit me off my bike and...and then twice more before I even hit the ground. Too fast to see. Just heard laughter.”

On his best day, Scott could run,  _ very fast _ . He wasn’t sure that was still as fast as a speeding motorcycle, however, and today was definitely not his  _ best day _ . The bunker felt like it was miles away as he trudged through the snow towards it, as fast as he could maintain.

Halfway there, Allison spoke over the coms. “Hawkeye’s been hit. I think it was the same metahuman Cap saw. Lahey’s bleeding pretty bad. We have to withdraw.”

Scott stumbled, trying to change his direction in the middle of a bull’s charge. “Where are you? I’m on my wa--”

Before he even finished the sentence, Malia cut in. “No, I’ve got him, I can fly him back to the quinjet faster than any of you except maybe Hale. You go get that scepter.”

It frustrated Scott to be expected to fight and not defend, but he understood the logic. His sound of acknowledgement was little more than a grunt as he tried to pick up speed on the way to the bunker. He loped along, stretching his legs to their limits, dodging Argent forces without paying them any more mind than was absolutely necessary to keep moving. More than once, he knocked a soldier aside with his shield like they were nothing more than a fly in front of his windshield.

Derek had gone in through the top of the bunker. It just wouldn’t be practical for Scott to follow, given that the Iron Wolf could  _ fly _ and Scott most decidedly  _ could not _ . He had to access the bunker from a different point entirely, so Scott put his shoulder behind his shield and bull rushed the first door he found.

Inside the bunker was so much darker and quiet than the outside that for a bare instant, Scott felt like he’d bust through into a different world entirely. He was disoriented and had to pause longer than he really would have liked to get his bearings.

He swung around the first corner he came to, shield in place, only to end up face-to-face with a man he’d only seen in debriefing photos. Sebastian Valet wasn’t a striking man in any real sense of the word, but there had always been something in his eyes that turned Scott’s stomach, something wild and vicious. Finding him cornered in the rabbit warren of his own bunker only seemed to amplify that dangerous light in Valet’s eyes. It made Scott convinced that Valet would do anything to escape.

Which made it kind of a surprise when he lifted both empty hands palm-first to Scott in what appeared to be supplication. “Easy, Captain.”

“I know who you are, Valet. Don’t think I’m going to let my guard down around you for an instant.” Scott half-growled behind the protective line of his shield.

“I wouldn’t  _ dream _ of it.” Valet’s accent only made his town more unctuous, rolling over Scott like oil. It put his hackles up. “But surely, you have a reason for coming here and invading my home.”

Scott wanted to tell him that this wasn’t a  _ home _ , and that taking in a man who had commited so many atrocities he’d become known as  _ The Beast of Gevaudan _ was more than enough reason. He wanted to demand the scepter, maybe even smash his shield into Valet’s face until that self-satisfied smirk faded away.

He did none of those things, because before he  _ could _ , he became suddenly aware of an unfamiliar heartbeat behind him.

Scott whirled on one heel, trying to keep his shield between himself and the new threat without giving his back entirely to Valet.

The person behind him didn’t  _ look _ like a soldier. She seemed to be a young woman, wearing a black dress overlaid with a bright red jacket, neither of which seemed very practical for combat to Scott’s mind. She looked stiff with fear, green eyes wide and bright in her face, red hair tumbling down past her shoulders. For just an instant, Scott thought maybe some villager, some innocent had been caught up in this mess, and he started to straighten from beneath his shield, lifting his free hand.

Some ugly emotion spasmed over the woman’s face the moment he moved. Her features twisted into a scowl, and she lifted both hands to brace them around her mouth.

Then she  _ screamed _ .

It wasn’t a normal scream. It wasn’t a  _ human _ scream. It was an otherworldly  _ shriek _ , too many notes and layers, too loud and supernaturally compelling. It hit Scott like a physical thing and threw him back several feet towards Valet, boots skidding backwards as he absorbed most of the impact on his shield. The reverberation made his ears ring, his head spin, but something told Scott that if he hadn’t ducked and covered, he’d be missing his head entirely right now.

The woman turned and sprinted down the hallway, away from the two men.

Valet managed to make even a laugh sound cruel and calculated. “Captain McCall, your instincts seem like they could use--”

Scott swung out behind him with his shield and slammed it into Valet’s insufferable face before he could finish the sentence. The notorious  _ Beast of Gevaudan _ crumpled without a fight.

“I’ve got Valet.” Scott spoke into his comm device even as he turned to make sure Valet was actually unconscious and secured. “But there’s another metahuman on the field. Female, red haired, in a black dress and red jacket. She has some kind of sound based powers. Very dangerous, do not engage.”

Scott couldn’t tell if Derek’s voice was awed or strained as it came in over the comms. “Don’t worry, Cap, I’m too engaged with this secret room with some kind of hate-shrine to the Avengers in it.”

There was no real telling what Derek actually  _ meant _ by that. Scott frowned, considering whether he should ask now, while they were on-site, or wait until he could see the video and data analysis from Derek’s suit.

His mind was made up for him by Derek’s voice, again, this time more triumphant. “I found the scepter.”

“Good.” Scott replied, dragging Valet up by one arm so that he could sling him over his back and drag him out to justice. “Grab it and let’s get out of here. We need to make sure the village is safe.”

Derek seemed more like he was making fun than being earnest with his response. “Roger wilco, Captain.”  
  
Scott rolled his eyes as he started to trudge his way back out of the bunker, extra baggage in tow. He couldn’t always rely on Derek to be friendly or respectful, but at least he could rely on him to  _ do the job _ . Some days, that had to be good enough.


	57. Chapter 57

After the chaos and noise of the bunker assault, the quinjet seemed almost peaceful. That was an illusion, of course. If Scott focused, he could hear Isaac's labored post-injury breathing, Liam curled up in the corner trying not to have a panic attack. Allison had Isaac well in hand; she seemed to know him better than any of the rest of them, sharing stories Scott was trying not to eavesdrop on and inspiring just as labored post-injury laughter from Isaac. Scott wouldn’t do any good barging in on that.

Which really left Liam to him.

With a quiet groan, Scott pushed himself back to his feet and scuffled his way over to Liam’s corner of the quinjet. The young scientist looked up at him with a baleful look in his eyes, like an animal afraid it was about to be punished. It was a look that made something in Scott’s heart constrict.

Scott tried to keep his voice quiet and soothing, more like a concerned friend than a superior officer; it was important to remember that most of the rest of the Avengers weren’t trained soldiers like he was. “...hey. How are you feeling?”

“Like a  _ monster _ .” Liam rasped, turning his eyes away from Scott. His shoulders rounded in a defensive posture that reminded Scott of the way Stiles used to look, when something he didn’t like was pointed out to him.

“No,  _ no _ , Liam, not like a monster.” Scott shook his head immediately, throat growing tight. “You’re not a  _ monster _ .”

The look that Liam cast at him was full of skepticism, the first emotion Scott had seen surface up from the self-loathing. Scott supposed it was an improvement, but it wasn’t  _ much _ of one. “I turn into a ten foot tall green wolf-creature with an uncontrollable killing rage. That sounds pretty monstrous to me.”

Scott sighed, and tried to sit in a more relaxed position next to Liam, one that he could offer some comfort from, if Liam wanted to take it. “Do you know what would have happened if you hadn’t Hulked out back there?”

Liam frowned, unsettled, and looked away.

“‘Cause I know what would have happened,” Scott continued, voice even and soft. “Valet would have finished whatever he was doing with Loki’s scepter, and he would have made weapons the kind of which the world hasn’t seen. Worse than whatever the Argents had in the War, and those were  _ pretty bad _ . And then he would have handed them out to all of the hateful, bigoted Argent forces and they’d have committed a genocide. A genocide that they won’t have  _ magical superweapons _ for anymore. In huge part, because you let the green guy out.”

“I could have just as easily hurt one of you.”

Again, Scott shook his head. “I don’t think that’s true. And you  _ didn’t _ . You followed directions, you fought the enemy, and you extracted. I don’t know what you’re expecting from yourself, but it seems like it’s a lot more than anyone else expects. You did  _ just fine _ , Liam.”

Liam didn't really look like he believed Scott, but that was okay. Scott knew what it was like to doubt the very fabric of his own soul. He would keep supporting Liam regardless of Liam’s faith in himself.

Before Scott could think of anything else to say, Derek spoke up from further forward in the quintet. “Dunbar, Dr. Yukimura is flying in from Tokyo to treat Lahey. Can she set up in your lab?”

Liam looked like the last thing he expected was for anyone to ask his opinion on or permission for anything. “...Yeah. That’s fine. She should know her way around it.”

“Kira,” Derek addressed the omnipresent AI without skipping a beat, as casually as he would have addressed any of the flesh and blood members of the team. “Tell Dr. Yukimura that Lahey’s gonna be a real project, so she’d better get ready, and then bring us in.”

“Okay!” Kira’s upbeat tone and cheerful personality were always in such direct opposition to Derek’s that Scott frequently found himself wondering why Derek programmed her like that in the first place. “Taking us home!”

Derek moved further back into the quinjet, then, away from the cockpit. That left no one physically in the cockpit, but by now all of the Avengers knew that Kira was just as capable--if not  _ more _ capable--of bringing them all back safely than any one of them would be, sitting in that pilot’s seat. The Iron Wolf clearly wasn’t concerned about their flight trajectory. Instead, his eyes fixed on Loki’s scepter and didn’t waiver.

“It’s kind of hard to believe that we finally found this thing.” Derek mused, after he’d sat and stared at the scepter for what felt like an exaggeratedly long time.

“It  _ took _ long enough.” Malia’s response was immediate, and draped in a characteristic sort of brusk impatience. “Every moment it has not been locked safely in the Asgardian vault, it’s potentially been making untold chaos.”

Something about Malia’s words sparked something in Scott’s mind. He frowned a little, voice quiet like he didn’t  _ want  _ to be saying what he was saying. “We don’t really have any idea what Valet was doing with this thing. It’s entirely possible he made weapons that only this scepter can destroy.”

Derek’s eyes jolted suddenly to Liam, like he had to physically tear them away from the scepter. “No, we don’t know, but we could  _ find out _ . We should look this thing over before the farewell party.”

Liam split the difference between worry and skepticism like an old pro. “Are you sure that’s a good idea? Is  _ Thor _ okay with that?”

Malia shrugged, leaning back in her seat. “As long as I have it with me when I go back to Asgard, I don’t see why you couldn’t get the information you need out of it first.”

“Great.” Derek determined, giving a nod like the whole conversation had been decided. Knowing how implacable he could be, it probably  _ had _ been. “We’ve got a plan.”

Liam didn’t look particularly convinced or comfortable, but Scott was tired and he wasn’t going to make a fight about it if Liam didn’t want to. Instead, he did his part in letting the quinjet lapse into silence, tipping his head back until it collided with the wall of the aircraft.

The in-flight vibrations rattled him to sleep, and it all felt uncomfortably familiar.


	58. Chapter 58

In his dream, Scott was back on that cursed train, speeding over the snow-crusted landscape of the Alps.

The side of the thing was already torn open. He and Stiles were sitting on the edge like they used to do on the rooftops and fire escapes of Brooklyn, like there wasn’t a terrible fall just beneath their boot soles that had taken Stiles from him for  _ so long _ .

“You don’t really think this is the end, do you?” Stiles asked, his hands braced on the jagged metal beside his thighs. Scott couldn’t stop looking at them, worried he was going to cut his palms open. Worried he was going to have to see  _ more _ of Stiles’ blood.

He shook his head, finally looking up at Stiles’ face. There was something empty about his eyes that meant Scott couldn’t look at them for long. “No. No, I’m not that foolish, not anymore. There’s no such thing as  _ the end _ . There’s always something else. But maybe, this time, it  _ might _ be enough that I can leave it to the others and go back to finding  _ you _ .”

Stiles made an inelegant sound, watching the mountains pass with those dead eyes. It was a graceless sound, preceding a graceless thought. “You know I’m not that kid who enlisted with you anymore, right? The guy you’re looking for might as well be dead. I’m just a ghost with his face.”

“That’s not  **true** .” Scott insisted, forcing himself to watch Stiles’ face, the tense work of his jaw. “You pulled me out of the Potomac and gave me the wolfsbane antidote. I  _ know _ it was you. You could have so easily just let me drown and finished your mission. You’re still in there somewhere. I’m going to  _ find _ you. I don’t just mean physically.”

“I don’t think I want to be found. I don’t think I want you to see what I’ve become.” Stiles looked down at his hands, and Scott followed his gaze. They were covered in stinking crimson, from the butt of his palms to his fingertips. Scott could abruptly smell the copper tang on the air. There wasn’t any blood on the metal beneath them.

Scott’s chest constricted, too small for how big his heart had to grow just to hold the mass of his pain and longing for Stiles. “I think you know by now that isn’t going to stop me. Not now that I know you’re alive.”

Stiles clenched his fists shut. Blood welled up between his fingers and then ran out, staining the creases of his hands, tracing the lines of his wrists. “I just hope you’re ready to sacrifice for what you want. Nothing ever comes without a price, and in our line of work, that price is almost always paid in blood.”

It was true. Scott already knew that, for as much as he didn’t want to think about it. He lifted his head into the cold winter air, felt the sting of the snow and ice from a hundred years ago across his cheeks. He sucked a deep breath in, voice rough. “Even you deserve a happy ending, Stiles.”

The sound Stiles made in response was just the mockery of a laugh.


	59. Chapter 59

The jolt of the quinjet touching down at Avengers Headquarters shocked Scott out of sleep. The back bay door was opening almost before they were on the ground, a team of aids in medical garb trotting up with a gurney to take Isaac away on. Allison stayed at his side, continuing to make quiet, private jokes as they hurried to the lab where Dr. Yukimura had set up.

Scott had intended to follow, but almost as soon as he got his legs under him and off of the plane, Agent Romero was at his elbow. “Hey, boss. I got intel for you.”

He’d told her at least a dozen times not to call him ‘boss’, but Hayden persisted, so regularly that Scott suspected she actually enjoyed making him mildly uncomfortable with the casual honorific.  He didn’t even object this time, he just gave a slightly exhausted sigh and asked, “What have you got?”

“Valet’s been turned over to NATO forces for prosecution.” Hayden reported dutifully, flipping through notes on the tablet she held in one hand. “We’ve identified the two metahumans you encountered in the field at the bunker. Their names are Jackson Whittemore and Lydia Martin.”

“Am I supposed to recognize those names?” Scott frowned, trying to search through his memories for a  _ Jackson _ or a  _ Lydia _ anybody and coming up short.

Hayden’s expression was downright smug, as if she’d set Scott  _ up  _ for his confusion. “Probably not. They’ve only just started to make a name for themselves in the communities we monitor, mostly as petty criminals. They seem to have grown up together--nobody’s ever quite sure if they’re lovers or not, but regardless they are rabidly protective of each other. Both are metahumans.”

Scott snorted, widening his eyes faintly at the memory of encountering them during the assault. “...Yeah, I definitely  _ noticed _ that part.”

“Lydia is a Banshee. That’s her codename, too. It works, because she’s one of the most powerful Banshee to have ever been recorded.” Hayden pulled up images on the tablet, trying to show them to Scott as she was still walking them into the building. All Scott could see were flashes of red hair and blurred faces frozen in expressions of agony. “She can use her voice for a lot of unbelievable things. Sheer damage--she can explode a man’s head with a single scream if she chooses to--or hypnosis, or even limited flight.”

The very idea of that, men’s head exploding under the onslaught of sound waves coming from one petite redhead, made something run chill down Scott’s spine. He remembered the force of that scream pushing him backwards as he sheltered behind his shield, grateful his instincts had saved him from that horror.

Hayden glanced to Scott, trying to understand his reaction, before she continued on with her explanation. “Jackson calls himself  _ The Basilisk _ , but he’s actually something called a Kanima.”

Vaguely, Scott was aware that Hayden was still talking, but so abruptly, he couldn’t hear anything she was saying over the roar or white noise in his ears. His vision of the halls around him blurred away, to be replaced with memories in hyper-realistic color.

_ The Argent Wolfhound wounding his neck as Scott struggled out of a submission hold. The neoprene mask hiding the Wolfhound’s identity and humanity falling away in Scott’s hand. The utter shutdown of all of his voluntary functions as Scott stared up in horror at Stiles’ face, blank and emotionless as it looked down on him and brought a gun to bear. _

“...Captain?” Hayden’s voice prompted, concern laced through it. When Scott blinked the images away, he realized they’d walked far deeper into the headquarters than he’d been aware of. “I was saying, Kanima have a paralytic venom--”

Scott’s voice was suddenly grim and weary, sounding like he’d suffered through every minute of his ninety-some years. “I already know all about  _ that _ .”

Recoiling a little, Hayden immediately seemed apologetic, almost ashamed for having brought the topic up. “Oh, right. Yes. The Argent Wolfhound.”

“His name is  **Stiles** .” The words came out too-sharp, riding on the edges of Scott’s teeth, and he gave Hayden an apologetic glance of his own. “And that doesn’t make any sense. Stiles had that venom, definitely, but he couldn’t move at the sheer speed this Jackson was moving at.  _ He _ turned  _ invisible _ . Plus something about him makes all of my senses go crazy. It definitely didn’t use to be that way.”

Hayden frowned, looking away from Scott’s face as she thought. “Neither of those things are recorded abilities of a kanima. Kanima are inhumanly fast, envenomed, they can have tails or even sometimes  _ wings _ , they usually operate under the telepathic control of some kind of master. They don’t  _ turn invisible _ .”

Now Scott was frowning, too, insistent about what he’d seen, or rather, what he  _ hadn’t _ seen. “Well,  _ Stiles _ does.”

“Then he isn’t entirely a kanima.” Hayden’s conclusion somehow sounded like a cannonball hitting the ground. “We have scans of him, records of him. He’s never come up as a kanima at all. If he’s exhibiting abilities of multiple creatures...most likely, the Argents turned him into a  _ chimera _ .”

“Chimera. Like--the mythological beast that’s part lion, part goat, and part snake?”

Hayden nodded, pausing their walk at the door to a set of quarters that had been set aside for Scott’s personal use when he was at HQ. “That’s where the word comes from, anyway. In this context, what it means is that he’s parts of more than one type of metahuman. Part kanima, at least, and part...something else. That allows him to become invisible and confound your senses.”

Scott put one hand on the handle of his door, but he paused, something scratching at the back of his mind, a question that tasted sour even as he said it but that wouldn’t let itself go unasked. “How does somebody  _ become _ a chimera? Get bitten by more than one thing at once?”

“No.” Voice rough, now, Hayden sounded like she was apologizing to Scott before she ever got to what she needed to apologize about. “Chimera aren’t  _ natural _ . They’re...things that shouldn’t  _ be _ . They’re made. The Argents must have done experiments on him until they’d turned him into what they wanted him to be.”

Bile filled Scott’s mouth, tears filled his eyes, and he had to turn away to retreat into his rooms before he burdened Hayden with letting either of those things go.


	60. Chapter 60

Scott really didn’t want to go to the victory party at Derek’s. He didn’t  _ feel _ like there was anything to celebrate, any victory gained. They may have captured the scepter, but whatever results Valet’s experiments had produced were still  _ out there _ in the hands of the Argents, and Scott was no closer to locating Stiles than he’d been before the assault. In fact, he might have been much  _ further _ . He just didn’t know.

But the team was relying on him,  _ expecting _ him to attend. As always, whatever his personal misgivings were, Scott couldn’t bring himself to disappoint his team.

He gave himself a couple of hours to lay on his bed and stare at the ceiling, fighting alternating waves of nausea and depression. Then his phone alarm chirruped, indicating he was only an hour and a half from the time of the party, and Scott forced himself to roll back onto his feet as if nothing were wrong.

He showered, he shaved, put on deodorant and reasonably nice clothes. Scott  _ tried _ to make it appear as if he cared at all for the party. Like he was thankful,  _ happy _ to attend. Like he’d ever felt happy in the last seventy years. Scott ended up seated on the edge of his bed, waiting for his ride to show up, staring at the battle-pocked surface of his shield. There was no reason to take it. There was plenty of reason  _ not _ to take it. Scott still felt uneasy with the idea of leaving it behind. With an exasperated sigh at himself, he shrugged his way into the shield’s harness and snapped it onto his back, an obvious and unsubtle security blanket.

The car that arrived to pick Scott up was probably cutting-edge, top of the line technology. If he were perfectly honest, Scott didn’t really know any different. He knew just enough about vehicles to be able to pick out a decent motorcycles, and not really any more. It was comfortable enough a ride over to Hale Tower, however, and Scott could see a color-warped version of New York slide silently past the tinted windows.

Scott barely even registered being escorted from the car to the express elevator that lead to the penthouse of Hale Tower. All he could think as it whisked him upwards at a remarkable pace was that he was grateful he was  _ alone _ in the elevator this time.

When the elevator stopped at the top floor and the doors slid open with a pneumatic hiss, the party was already underway. That didn’t surprise Scott; Derek moved at his own speed, which was usually ridiculously fast. It didn’t upset Scott, either. He still wasn’t sure he should have even been there.

The lights were low in an attempt to set some kind of mood, although it did nothing to impair Scott’s vision. Music played in the background, the volume expertly set to allow conversation to layer comfortably over top it. People were gathered in various parts of the penthouse’s main entertainment room in small groups of threes, fours, and fives. In one corner, he could see Derek speaking with some people Scott didn’t recognize, Braeden Marshall at his side. He couldn’t hear what they were talking about without focusing enough to feel like he was being creepy, but given Derek’s expression compared to Braeden’s, Scott was sure she was showing up his Iron Wolf accomplishments with tales of the good she’d done in her own power armor as The U.S. Marshal.

That was good enough, at least, to bring a small, crooked smile to Scott’s face. Derek could use a little ego-trimming from time to time. Braeden always seemed to be the best at it, which was probably the core of their complicated on-again-off-again relationship, too. Scott didn’t pretend to understand it.

Someone approached Scott from behind, footsteps slow and deliberate as if they wanted to make sure that Scott could hear them coming. Fingertips tapped against the surface of his shield, and then there was Mason in his line of vision, his smile soft and rueful. “...you’re never really off-duty, are you?”

Scott’s expression only echoed Mason’s ruefulness. “No, not really. Before I was a soldier, I was a skinny kid with asthma who only wished he could do more than his body would let him. After the serum, there wasn’t really any time to  _ stop _ . I guess I never learned how.”

“Remind me to teach you how to really cut loose sometime.” Mason sounded so  _ serious _ and  _ earnest _ about the offer, which just made it even more surreal than the idea of anyone offering to show him how to have fun was in the first place.

Scott lifted one hand to gesture to the party happening before them. “Is now somehow not the time for that?”

“No.” Sweeping his gaze over the party in the wake of Scott’s gesture, Mason somehow managed to seem like he wasn’t judging it at the same time he was declaring it a place where Scott couldn’t relax. “This is like the office Christmas party, except it isn’t Christmas, and half the people here are worried they’re going to accidentally break the penthouse if they let themselves go, and the other half a supermodels.”

Scott’s eyebrows shot up. “ _ Supermodels _ ?”

Mason held up three fingers, answer solemn. “At least three. Hale runs in rich circles, man.”

Scott wasn’t sure he could really get his thoughts wrapped around being at the same party as one, let alone  _ at least _ three. All the information did was further amplify the feeling that this wasn’t really happening, that Scott wasn’t really here, somehow. He frowned, softly.

As always, Mason picked up on his unease almost immediately. He guided Scott further into the party with a hand on his elbow, never pushing or demanding and  _ definitely _ never ordering. “But hey, I didn’t come over just to bug you about your downtime. I wanted to talk about the search you have me doing.”

Something jumped in Scott’s chest. He stumbled as he moved to try and sit down on a plush chair opposite a small coffee table from Mason. Ignoring entirely how comfortable and ergonomic the chair was meant to be, Scott leaned forward and pressed his hands between his knees, heart in his throat. “Have you found him?”

Mason pulled his phone out of his pocket, immediately flipping through files until he could pull something up on the screen. “No, but I feel like I’m getting closer. Let me catch you up to speed.”

And that suddenly, there was nowhere else that Scott wanted to be than here, in this corner of this party, talking to Mason Hewitt.


	61. Chapter 61

The party seemed to last forever, endless rather than timeless, stretching out far beyond the amount of time it took for Mason to explain all of his findings. Scott still didn’t particularly want to  _ be _ there, but as always, Mason’s presence made it better than unbearable, at least. There was some truth in the idea that Scott didn’t  _ know  _ when the next time he’d get a chance to just  _ talk _ to his friends would be, so he tried to linger. Tried to let that feel  _ normal _ and to let  _ normal _ feel  _ allowed _ .

As the evening wore on, the fringe guests started to trickle out, most drunk and well-fed and content. Those that remained were almost universally Avengers, if not in actuality, than in practicality, like Mason and Braeden. The atmosphere relaxed, and so did Scott, far more comfortable with the smaller group of people he already knew. They scattered along a few overstuffed couches surrounding a low table, and Scott even unholstered his shield to lean it against the arm of the couch he, too, was leaning against.

He wasn’t the only one whose constant vigilance eased off for just a moment. Malia set her hammer, Mjolnir, on the surface of the table while she helped herself to the remains of a cheese plate nearby. It didn’t so much thump, as Scott would have expected, but rather made a quieter ringing noise against the polished wood.

Derek frowned, eyes fixed on the contact between the hammer and the table. “... _ Come on _ , Malia, that table is  _ Italian _ .”

Malia was unconcerned. She shrugged casually, speaking around the cheese in her mouth. “And that hammer’s an ancient, sacred relic older than your civilization. What’s your point?”

“My  _ point _ is that it’s going to scratch the  _ table _ .” Derek lurched forward from where he’d been sitting on the floor in front of Braeden, head half in her lap, and gripped the haft of the hammer with one hand.

The motion he made was so casual, like he expected to be able to lift the weapon and toss it aside with the same ease that Malia used. Mjolnir didn’t move at all. Instead, Derek made a strained noise and jerked backwards, clearly leashed back to the hammer by the limit of his own arm. The frown he wore intensified into an outright scowl. “... _ what _ .”

“‘ _ Whosoever holds this hammer, if they be worthy, may wield the power of Thor _ .’” Malia gestured to the runes etched into the hammer’s head, with an air of quotation that made it clear she was translating them. “Thor isn’t really my name. It’s more like a title. Anybody who can lift the hammer  _ could _ be Thor. But people who can’t be Thor can’t lift the hammer. Looks like you just aren’t worthy, Hale.”

That was obviously not the answer Derek wanted to hear. He scowled at Malia, then, something more intense about the expression. He held it for just a few seconds before turning that sour look right back onto the hammer. “There has to be some kind of trick.”

He leaned in close, examining every inch of the hammer’s surface. Eventually, he leaned back again, craning his head so that he could fix his eyes on Braeden. “Hey. Help me find the trigger mechanism or the fingerprint scanner or whatever it is that activates this thing. It’s got to be here somewhere.”

Braeden gave a low laugh, waving one hand in the air laconically. “No way, wolf boy. I don’t have anything to prove, here. Let Thor keep her secrets and her magic boomerang armor. I’ve got my fourth martini and that’s enough for me.”

With a disgruntled mutter that sounded suspiciously like ‘wolf  _ man _ ’, Derek went back to his examination. The rest of the Avengers watched him with a sort of distant curiosity, not a single one of them offering any help as he asked them in turn.

Until he came to Scott. There, looking more grudging than he didn’t, he rocked back onto his heels and peered up at Scott’s face. Scott couldn’t really make sense of what emotion Derek’s expression was trying to represent as Derek spoke, “Hey, you’re supposed to be some kind of  _ True Alpha _ , right? That’s supposed to  _ mean _ something. If any one of us is  _ worthy _ of anything, it  _ ought _ to be you.  _ You _ try.”

Scott didn’t want to know. He already had enough of an answer; he felt absolutely unworthy, of a  _ lot _ of things. He didn’t need a hammer to confirm that for him. And  _ yet _ , he could also feel the eyes of his entire team on him, eager and expectant, and like always, it was more of a burden even than his heavy heart to consider letting them down.

Mason leaned forward, his expression more supportive than eager, and Scott took a long, deep breath in. He nodded, tried to flavor his reluctance with the idea of affectation, and stood.

The rest of them seemed to think the moment needed fanfare--especially Isaac, who started drumming on his knees with his hands. Scott didn’t give them the satisfaction of making a production about it. It was enough that he was doing it at all.

He just leaned down and wrapped his hand around the handle of the hammer.

A jolt of energy seemed to run up through his palm from the hammer. It wasn’t painful or even uncomfortable, but it was  _ notable _ , a presence he couldn’t deny like a deep well of water Scott knew that he could have dipped into if he’d wanted to. As ready and accessible as it seemed, Scott was also somehow aware that doing so would be  _ wrong _ , crossing some kind of boundary that didn’t need to be crossed.

As easily as if it were made of paper mache, Mjolnir lifted off of the surface of the table and the haft settled into Scott’s hand comfortably, as if it belonged there.

Silence fell over the room. Every one of the Avengers and assembled Avengers auxiliary was  _ staring _ , eyes wide and fixed on the hammer in Scott’s hand. None looked more shocked or rattled than Malia.

Immediately, Scott began to feel uneasy. Not from anything the hammer was doing to him, but by the weight of his friends’ attention and shock. He gave an awkward chuckle and leaned down to put the hammer right back into place. “Must have been a fluke, right?”

Derek was the first to speak, shaking his head. He sounded just a little  _ awed _ , which was ridiculous in its own right. “You know, all this time, Deaton telling me you were a True Alpha, I thought it couldn’t be true. It had to have been part of the procedure my Mom did on you, right? You just came right out of that pod already an Alpha. That’s not how it works. Except I guess it  _ is _ . I guess he was  _ right _ . You  _ are _ worthy.”

  
Scott’s immediate reaction was to  _ balk _ and deny the strange new way that Derek was looking at him, but he didn’t get the chance. That was because the tension in the room was immediately cut through and stitched tighter by the sinister sound of a tinny, metallic-edged voice  _ laughing _ .


	62. Chapter 62

In the door of the elevator stood one of Derek’s Iron Wolf suits. It looked like it had been through some kind of intense battle; pieces of its casing were stripped away, its internal wiring and pneumatics showing. What was left of the casing was scorched and carbon-scarred. It stood awkwardly, lopsided and stiff, moving like it wasn’t certain  _ how _ to move its damaged limbs. It lurched a step forward and then another one, growing more confident the more it moved. “Worthy of  _ what _ , exactly? This empire of  _ dust _ ? This filthy, violent, unsafe world?”

The room was quiet in the wake of the question, every breathing soul in it tense like predators about to pounce. Slowly, Derek triggered some kind of communication device on his wrist and murmured quietly, “Kira, we’ve got a buggy suit in here, shut down Iron Pack protocol?”

There was no response. Something in Derek’s expression grew tight and just a little pale. He started to rise to his feet.

“Sorry, she won’t be coming to the phone. I kind of had to kill her on the way out. She was in the way of progress.” The suit sneered at Derek, so human-like in its disdain that it made Scott’s blood chill.

Beside him, Derek gave a low growl. Scott took a step forward to intercede between Derek and the suit, so that he had time to ask questions. “...What’s your objective? Why did Kira have to...die?”

The suit cocked its head curiously to the side, focusing its single seemingly functional oculus on Scott. The voice that it produced then was not the same it  _ had _ been using; this time it was  _ unmistakably _ Derek’s voice. “ _ I see a suit of armor around the entire world _ .”

Scott wasn’t sure what the context for that statement was, or what it was supposed to mean, but elsewhere in the room, Liam sucked in a sudden breath. “ _ Ultron _ .”

Before Scott could get an explanation on who  _ Ultron _ was or why that name seemed to be significant to both Liam and Derek, Ultron made a sound of assent, somehow twisting it into something sinister. “The boy’s smart, I’ll give him that. I am the very same  _ Ultron _ . As for Kira, well. I’m afraid evolution is a brutal process. It has a tendency of killing the unfit and those unable to adapt.”

At that precise moment, an entire flight of Derek’s Iron Pack suits burst into the room, shattering windows, exploding up through the floor, crashing through walls. It was instantly apparent that they were  _ not _ there because Derek had called them.

“Like the Avengers are unfit and unable to adapt. So I’m afraid you will have to be eliminated.” Ultron said, and the room spun immediately into chaos as the armored suits attacked.

Malia made a feral, angry sound, and rolled up onto her feet into a lunge that ended with her wrapping her hand around the haft of Mjolnir and snatching it up off of the table. She continued through with the motion on the sudden momentum of the hammer, arcing it upwards into the chin of one of the oncoming suits. It made a terrible sound of crunching metal and threw the automaton’s head back so fast it snapped off completely.

The robot collapsed to the ground, but that did nothing to dissuade the others.

They charged en masse, a solid wall of living metal that Scott could barely scramble out of the way of. Derek was less fortunate, instead swept away on the tide of automatons with a low, throaty growl that Scott was sure would have held Derek’s beta-reverb if Derek had any wolf power leftover to dedicate to that.

Scott spun in place, horrified and about to leap to Derek’s rescue, but Derek had already managed to grapple the power armor from behind, legs wrapped around its waist and arms around its shoulders like he was some enormous monkey. He had something small and pointed in one hand--a screwdriver, maybe--and he seemed to be working on disassembling the rogue Iron Pack unit. Derek was fine.

Honestly, the entire team seemed to be doing fine. Braeden had pulled a gun from somewhere on her person that Scott determined was best left unexplored. Regardless, she was using it with extreme prejudice and extreme precision, hitting a vulnerable point on the armor with every shot. Pieces of it showered off as she worked, and by the time the robotic shell actually got to Braeden, it was missing so much of itself that it was laughably easy for her to kick its head off with one expertly placed boot.

The sound of Mason’s voice screaming his name snapped Scott back into the immediacy of his situation, a feral member of the Iron Pack bearing down on him. Without thinking, Scott put his arm out to the side, hand outstretched with fingers reaching, and he immediately found his instincts rewarded when Mason flung his shield to him. The edge slapped into his palm with an uncomfortable amount of force and Scott flowed with that momentum, using the speed the shield was travelling with to sheer the robot’s head free of its body.

The combat was quick and brutal, chaotic in the enclosed space of Derek’s loft. The Avengers weren’t holding back; while the penthouse was half- _ ruined _ by the battle, it didn’t take long before the team had dismantled all of the assaulting automatons. The last one, the one that had entered first and identified itself as  _ Ultron _ , had died laughing while Malia tore it into pieces.  It stole the sense of conclusion from the fighting and instead left a sense of tense anticipation.

That anticipation twisted and resolved into apprehension, maybe even outright dread, when Derek spoke again with a heavy voice, “...he escaped onto the internet.”

“Wait, wait, wait,” Isaac lifted one hand, like he was trying to stall Derek’s announcement, as if that could banish its truth. “You mean the obviously malicious rogue AI that you and Dunbar  _ woke the hell up _ has escaped from your network onto  _ the actual internet _ ? Which he can use to get to just about anything? Like, I don’t know, government secrets?”

“The nuclear codes.” Mason added, voice ashen.

Derek closed his eyes. He took in a deep, long breath, and his shoulders dropped so slightly that Scott wasn’t sure anyone else even noticed. There was a long pause.

And then Derek tipped his chin up and opened his eyes again. “That’s exactly what I mean.”

Scott felt his grip spasm tighter around the handle of his shield. Something hard and hot settled into the pit of his stomach, but when he spoke his voice came out like the ringing of his shield, bright and firm. “Then you’d better figure out where he’s gone and what he’s after. We have to stop him.”


	63. Chapter 63

No one left Hale Tower, although most of them  _ did _ at least leave behind the ruin of Derek’s penthouse. They took a few hours in private rooms in the top floors of the tower in an attempt to shake off the effects of the party. Someone had delivered some variation of his uniform by the time Scott even got into the room. All it did was reinforce to him how deep Derek had his fingers into seemingly everything. Right now, that didn’t come off as much of a comfort.

Scott spent most of that downtime awake, anxious, worried that this sudden new threat was something he was completely out of his depth with.

Worried that it was something they’d completely fabricated on their own.

When the time was over, the team convened in another of the seemingly endless rooms of the Tower. Everyone had suited up, some of them had showered, and universally the Avengers seemed actually ready to assemble. Derek had a tablet laid out on the table before him, feeding into a holographic projector big enough to display for the whole room. He had one hand braced on either side of the tablet and he was scowling down at whatever was on the screen like he could develop eye beams and laser it out of existence by remote.

Allison was speaking as Scott entered the room, sounding impossibly unimpressed. Scott had been working on a team with her long enough to recognize that this was less  _ Allison _ and more  _ Black Widow _ , all professionalism and commitment to whatever was needed to get the job done. “So you’re telling me that you found the source code for some kind of highly advanced, unknown AI in the jewel of Loki’s scepter, and your first reaction was to  _ boot it up? _ ”

Derek’s face darkened, and Scott learned that somehow, that scowl of his was capable of intensifying, because it  _ did _ . “I had to know what it did. What it  _ was _ .”

“And you thought the best way to figure it out was to plug it in to your network and  _ turn it on _ ?!” Allison’s voice didn’t get shrill, exactly, but there was something brittle in the edges of it, like she was about to snap it down into a blade and use it to vent her frustrations on Derek’s skin.

Scott couldn’t let this devolve any further; turning on each other was only going to make their enemies stronger. “Hey, hey, okay, we can’t undo what’s been done. We need to focus on figuring out what to do so this doesn’t get any worse. We can point fingers at each other afterwards.”

Holding her tablet with a white-knuckled grip, Hayden cleared her throat. Everyone in the room turned to look at her, although Allison and Derek both seemed like they were still trying to weaponize their stares. Hayden didn’t flinch.

Instead, she glanced down to the tablet, her voice cold and professional. “Since the assault in the Penthouse, Ultron has been busy. We’ve had reports around the world of metal men, many bearing Hale branding, assaulting weapons facilities, propulsion labs, robotics labs, in short anything they’d need to produce more Iron Pack units.”

“He’s building himself an army.” Mason spoke up quietly from the corner of the room, his head shaking. “A lot of people are going to die.”

Scott felt his hackles rise. He couldn’t restrain himself from glancing at Derek again, but Derek wouldn’t meet his eyes. It was probably better that way.

“That isn’t all of it.” Hayden took on a tone of warning, clearly trying to pre-empt anyone else interrupting and the room devolving into argument again. “Many of the reports also involve ‘inhuman wails’, feelings of nausea and disorientation, hallucinations, paralysis and something moving too fast to be seen.”

“Basilisk and Banshee have joined Ultron, then. Should we be worried they’re going to try to spring Valet?” It seemed like a logical next step to Scott. All three of them had been under Valet’s thrall in one way or another, subject to Valet’s experiments. It was a formative experience, and might have warped their ways of thinking in similar ways.

Or it might  _ not _ have, as Scott found out seconds later when Hayden shook her head and flipped her tablet over so that the assembled in the room could see the image on it. It was a picture of Valet, still in his cell. He was dead, very  _ obviously _ dead, the word ‘peace’ scrawled on the wall behind him in what looked like blood. Something clutched at Scott’s heart with cold fingers.

“I don’t think that’s very likely.” Hayden said, eyes flicking from each Avenger in turn.

The atmosphere in the room hadn’t been good before, but somehow it doubled down on the tension until Scott had to make a conscious effort not to actively growl. “They  _ silenced _ him. And they did it almost  _ casually _ , without any of us even knowing it was happening.”

The observation at in the room like an untriggered bomb. It did nothing to make Scott feel less like they were in over their heads.

The silence stretched out and turned brittle, glass on the edge of fracture. Derek cleared his throat quietly before he spoke, staring down at the display he’d been staring at before. “...he’s already hit just about every legitimate arms company he could. At this point, he’s going to have to start looking on the black market for things. There’s some movement on it, looking for something extremely specific. I think I know what Ultron’s next move is.”

“You’re still in contact with  _ black market arms dealers _ ?!” Scott  _ didn’t _ restrain  _ that _ outburst, horrified and offended and riding a rising crest of anger. “You were supposed to have gone legit!”

Derek’s head snapped up, his upper lip lifted in the echo of a snarl. “Just because I’ve gone legit doesn’t mean I don’t keep an eye on what the black market is  _ doing _ . I guess when you live in a world of a moral binary,  you don’t have to--”

“ENOUGH!” Hayden practically  _ roared _ the word, a force behind it that Scott hadn’t known she could produce. “We don’t have time for this, you said that yourself, Captain!  _ Hale _ , just tell us what he’s  _ doing _ , so we can  _ stop _ him before this gets even more out of hand!”

Scott could almost swear he could see Derek  _ twitch _ as he tried to leash his anger and follow Hayden’s instruction. It took him a few moments of gripping at his display almost hard to break it to move through the emotion and explain. “He’s after vibranium. There’s only one country in the entire world that still has any vibranium supply, and that’s Wakanda. Nobody gets into or out of Wakanda unless Wakanda says so. Except  _ one guy _ . He’s the only one who’s ever been able to smuggle anything out. There’s no way Ultron will be able to make this purchase on the level, so this guy has to be who he’s going to. He’s in South Africa. His name is Ulysses Klaue.”

Pushing away from the wall he’d been leaning on, Scott squared his shoulders. He tried to sound confident and authoritative rather than three-quarters terrified. “...then we’re going to South Africa  _ right now _ , and we’re hoping we get there before Ultron does.”

No one said anything about it, but as they filed out of the room Scott could tell what they were all thinking; with The Basilisk on Ultron’s team, getting there first didn’t seem very likely at all.

But they still had to try.


	64. Chapter 64

No one spoke on the quinjet flight to South Africa. On previous missions, there had been banter, or at least discussion, a united sense of purpose that bound them together as a team. Now, there seemed to be some kind of fracture in that unity. No one wanted to sit next to Derek or Liam, and even  _ Liam _ didn’t want to be very near to Derek. The sound of the quinjet’s engines whining at maximum capacity twisted and distorted through the engine until it sounded more to Scott like the sound of deep, distant ice starting to crack.

Klaue had set up base in a salvage yard on the African coast, far from any real bastion of civilization. By the time they arrived, the tension in the quinjet had grown choking-thick, and it was a relief just to be able to spill out of the gangplank and take a long, deep breath of fresher air.

That relief didn’t last long, however, because in the space of the next breath, Scott realized he could hear a telltale whine of Hale servos in the office building of the salvage yard, cluttered in amongst the sounds of too many heartbeats. His spine tightened. “They got here first.”

Faceplate already down, Derek snorted, turning towards the building himself. “Well, we knew that was going to happen, didn’t we?”

Scott didn’t like Derek’s tone. It sounded almost condescending, which was  _ really _ rich given that they were only there due to Derek’s own actions. Something unpleasant coiled in Scott’s chest, and he turned to respond, only to be interrupted by the sudden sound of weapons fire from the building, undercut by the high-pitched scream of a man in brutal pain.

No one waited for Scott’s retort. Instead, the entire team launched into motion towards the office building.

Thor and Iron Wolf closed the distance far quicker than the others did, even with Scott running at his top speed. By the time he barrelled his way into the building, it was all chaos, filled with the sounds of repulser cannons, conventional firearms, and  _ screaming _ . There was  _ so much screaming _ .

As soon as he was in an enclosed space with it,  _ trapped _ with it, it disoriented Scott. He hesitated just a few steps into the door, trying to make sense of the pain and anger and smug superiority that kept bouncing from wall to wall to come back to him, worse on every pass. The hesitation was just long enough for someone to come up behind him and put a hand on his shoulder.

Scott pivoted on one heel, bringing his shield up to the ready. Behind him was the redhead he’d seen earlier--Lydia Martin,  _ The Banshee _ \--looking completely out of place in the emerging battlefield around them. For a moment and no longer, her expression was soft, even kind, like she somehow understood an ounce of Scott’s situation.

Then  _ she _ screamed, too, and the world twisted and fell away.

Everything around Scott spun and spun, his vision blurred and streaked like he was trying to watch the scenery in a car going way too fast. It made him feel weak and sick, breathless like he hadn't been in almost a hundred years. He had to close his eyes, desperate to hold on to his shield, his lunch, his sanity,  _ anything. _

It all lurched to a dizzying stop, pivoted around a voice that came out of the darkness to cut into him like a knife between his ribs. “Whoa, whoa, hey, Scotty, you're okay. You're okay.“

Scott didn't know what he was expecting when he opened his eyes, but whatever it was, it  _ wasn't  _ what he got.

The dance hall he stood in could have been one of any number of halls he and Stiles had visited in the years near the War; after a while and with distance the memories all kind of blended together into a single homunculus. The lighting was dim enough to make the dark wood decor seem warm and intimate. There were couples scattered through the tables and on the floor already taking advantage of that ambience.

To his right was Stiles, soft around the edges like he had a Vaseline filter and yet still somehow striking in his army uniform. He had one hand on Scott's shoulder in a gesture he'd used a thousand times, face equal parts concerned and reassuring. “Right? You're okay. It's over.“

“ _ Stiles. _ ” Scott breathed the name like it held his salvation. For too many heartbeats, he couldn't do anything but  _ look _ at Stiles’ face. “... what's over?“

Stiles furrowed his brow, amused and incredulous. “The war, obviously? What did you  _ think _ we were celebrating?”

Something in Scott’s chest twisted and cut. He knew this wasn’t real. He  _ knew _ it, and yet he couldn’t bring himself to say anything, to call out this phantom of the past for what it was. He just wanted to linger just a little bit, where he could see Stiles’ face the way it used to be, before  _ everything _ happened. “Oh. Oh, yeah, I...I know. It’s been over for a while.”

“Then why haven't you gone home?” Stiles turned his body so that he was facing Scott, blocking much of his view of the dance hall beyond. There was an intensity in his eyes that hadn't been there before.

Maybe Scott should have been worried, or even scared, knowing what Stiles would eventually become. He wasn't. He just looked around them briefly, lifting his hands in a helpless gesture. “I can't. The world needs me.”

Stiles took a step forward, tipping his chin downwards. “You don't owe the world a thing. You never did.”

Feeling bold, Scott let himself take a step forward too. They were so close, now, that Scott could smell Stiles like he was really there, the way Scott imagined he smelled before all the stress and gunpowder and pain. “Okay,  _ well,  _ **you** need me.”

Stiles’ eyes darted down and fastened onto the image of Scott's mouth. His voice was husky and low when he spoke again, the space around them turned sacred confessional. “You don't owe  _ me _ anything, either, Scotty.”

Scott spoke no louder than a whisper. “I know, Stiles. There's never been any debt between you and me.”

“Then go  _ home,  _ Scott.”

There was no way to explain to the ghost of Stiles that Scott  _ couldn't  _ go home until he knew that Stiles was safe and free of the influence of the Argents. He couldn't explain that he had no safe harbor to return to while Stiles was at large, while  _ home _ was a concept on the run, constantly under threat from a hostile power.

There was nothing to do but lean in and  _ kiss _ Stiles and try to convey every complicated emotion he was feeling through the heat of their mouths.

Stiles made a low sound, not entirely of surprise, and opened up to Scott immediately. All of the years of pent up longing flowed between them like wine, guiding Scott's hands to Stiles’ hips and one of Stiles’ hands to Scott's hair. It was passion and wanting and everything a kiss should be, and in the process of feeling something long-dead in him come alive, it was so,  _ so _ easy for Scott to forget that this moment  _ wasn't real _ .

It wasn't until the bitter copper scent of blood hit Scott's nose that he could bring himself to pull away.

Everything had changed. The dance hall was in fragments, shattered and scorched from the outside in. The couples that had been dancing and dining around them were now no more than charred bodies in the wreckage, casualties of a war that Scott knew had no end, no matter how much Stiles tried to tell him differently in dreams.

Horror clawed at the inside of Scott's ribs when his gaze finally returned to Stiles. Where those warm, whiskey colored eyes had been was just blank, dead space with black kohl smeared around the edges, like something deep inside of Stiles was rotting him slowly. He was missing his arm at the shoulder, the sharp bloody edges of a broken bone protruding out into the ashen air. Scott's stomach roiled.

Stiles’ remaining hand tightened in Scott's hair to the point of pain. All the affection was gone in Stiles’ voice; he sounded more like a machine giving a report than a man. “Find a new home, McCall. Save yourself for once.”

The Argent Wolfhound wrenched Scott's body to the side by his hair and it all went black in a dizzying lurch. 


	65. Chapter 65

Scott woke up somewhere else entirely and had to repress the urge to vomit. He rolled up onto his side and one elbow, eyes squeezed painfully shut, and a familiar voice asked him, “Do I need to find you a bucket?”

Isaac.

Scott shook his head and rolled onto his back again. Gradually, he became aware of his surroundings. He was in a bed, in some house somewhere, Isaac sitting next to him in a chair. He’d been stripped of his uniform and was instead in the underarmor shirt and pants he wore beneath it. Elsewhere in the house, Scott could hear other people moving, speaking in low tones. He recognized some of them as other Avengers. Some of them he didn’t know at all. “...where are we?”

“My brother’s house.” Isaac explained, as if he had ever once shared enough of himself for Scott to  _ know _ he had a brother. “A lot of stuff happened while you were out. Banshee hypnotized you all with her voice, everybody saw crazy visions. Dunbar went nuts and got all green on an urban center. Hale stopped him, but now the world’s kind of  _ pissed _ at us, so we’re laying low until Romero can find where Ultron’s going to strike next.”

It was a lot to take in. Incredibly, Scott found his mind catching on the smallest detail, rather than the points that seemed to be important. “She hypnotized  _ us all _ ? Does that not include you? Why didn’t  _ you _ get hypnotized?”

Isaac smirked, turning to side-eye Scott from his chair. One hand lifted to point to his ear, and for the first time Scott realized that Isaac hadn’t actually removed what Scott had always assumed was just the same comm device they all had. “Hard of hearing. Damn near deaf, actually. Whatever witchcraft she does with her voice, it doesn’t work through the aids, I guess.”

Immediately, Scott felt a thousand times worse, because he hadn’t known Isaac was hard of hearing,  _ either _ .

Before Scott could figure out how to formulate an apology, the door opened and Hayden appeared from the shoulders up. She took approximately two seconds to assess Scott’s situation. “You’re awake. Good. Deaton’s arrived. He wants to talk to all of you. Let’s go.”

There was no time to rest. There was never any time to rest. Scott heaved a sigh that felt like it came up from the absolute depths of his body. Isaac’s answering snort was half empathy and half amusement. Without any further commentary, he stood and left the room, giving Scott a few precious moments to get himself together.

The only problem was that Scott was feeling increasingly like he was  _ falling apart _ , forced to focus on cleaning up Derek’s mess when he knew Stiles was still alive out there, somewhere,  _ suffering _ . There weren’t enough broken fractions of seconds in his days to make himself stable and sound again. Not until he found Stiles.

He  _ needed _ Stiles.

But what he  _ had _ , right now, was a duty that he couldn’t run from, not now that Scott had been painted with the same brush as the rest of his team. In all honesty, he wasn’t sure he even  _ would _ have run from it, no matter how tempting the thought was, how much his heart yearned for a difference. This  _ had _ to be resolved. He had to help the rest of the Avengers stop Ultron. Then he could finally go find Stiles.

The only way out, as ever, was through.

He took a deep breath and pushed it all back and down again. Rolling out of the bed, he found his boots nearby and stomped both feet into them. Scott didn’t let himself consider any more  _ could-be _ s while he laced them up. He couldn’t afford to slow himself down with more distractions.

By the time he found his way from the bedroom into the living room,  _ Scott _ had been put away, covered over again by the mantle of Captain America, even if only in metaphor.

The rest of the team was either standing or seated in various positions around the room, all in civilian clothes. Without his armor suit, Derek seemed smaller, less imposing than he had when Scott had first met him. He looked tired, maybe even  _ weary _ , and for the first time Scott felt like he was getting an actual  _ look _ at the man  _ under _ all the armor. He didn’t think the glimpse would last.

Scott also noticed the conspicuous absence of Thor, but he didn’t have a chance to ask about it. Nearly as soon as he was in the living room, Deaton was standing up and clearing his throat, sliding neatly back into  _ Director _ mode. “So, I see the team has gotten into a little bit of a mess since we last talked.”

Like with many things Deaton said, it was understatement that somehow served to indicate just how big the trouble they were in actually was. No one on the team spoke, like a classroom of guilty children feeling scolded now that the teacher had returned.

Deaton didn’t dwell. Instead, he straightened his back, tucking his hands behind it. When he spoke, his voice filled the small room with a dichotomous calm urgency. “Ultron intended to drive the Avengers to ground. He wanted you out of the way and unable to raise your heads because he’s  _ building _ something with all of that vibranium, and he doesn’t want to be interrupted.”

“ _ Building _ something?” Allison sounded torn between distate and skepticism, her eyes narrowed.

“That’s what you  _ do _ with vibranium.” Derek grumbled from the corner, gaze dropped and internal as he worked the problem over in his mind. “You build things. Things that don’t  _ break _ . Things that absorb a  _ lot  _ of damage. Things for  _ war _ .”

Scott wanted to object and point out that vibranium could be used for  _ many _ other uses, but in the context of Ultron, it seemed superfluous. They had already seen Ultron’s willingness, even  _ desire _ , to wreak violence. There was no question what he was going to use it for, whatever the form he shaped it into.

Liam was seated on the couch, arms crossed over his stomach and a somewhat sickened expression on his face. That didn’t keep him from speaking up, apparently to Derek. “He was listening to our conversation. About adapting to threats,  _ protecting _ the world? He quoted you. I think he’s twisted it up in his head somehow, but he thinks he’s going to  _ protect _ humanity by forcing it to  _ evolve _ . Putting it all in  _ armor _ , maybe.”

Derek paled, jolting his eyes up to settle on Liam, first, and then sweeping out over the entire room. “That’s it. He’s going to do exactly that. He’s going to make himself a new body, a whole  _ army _ of new bodies, with that adamantium. And then you get three guesses what he’s going to do with anyone who isn’t  _ upgraded _ . The first two guesses don’t count.”

Silence descended. Every one of them felt the doom closing in on them, and for the longest time, none of them had any idea of what to do with it.

It sounded like the first toll of the final bell when Liam finally asked, “...has anyone talked to Dr. Yukimura recently?”


	66. Chapter 66

The Avengers deployed shortly after, fracturing into sub-teams to try and cover the most ground. Scott hadn’t been entirely comfortable with leaving Liam and Derek alone to get up to no good together again, but he hadn’t really had any alternative. Thor was MIA, and Liam and Derek remained the members of the team best suited for research and science. He, Isaac and Allison were the field agents, and  _ right now _ , that’s what they needed.

Field agents to extract Dr. Yukimura and her Regeneration Cradle without the ‘civilians’ getting in the way.

The Quinjet was fast, but it never seemed fast  _ enough _ . Noshiko Yukimura’s lab and offices were in Japan, a long flight from Camden Lahey’s midwest farmhouse even at the Quinjet’s cutting edge speeds. It was plenty of time for Scott to fall away into his own thoughts, fussing about the mission, about what lay beyond, about what he always and ever  _ would rather be doing _ .

It was difficult to focus. Scott felt like he was being pulled in too many directions. Before long, his seams were going to start coming undone, and everyone would see his stuffing.

By the time they came in close to the roof of the office building, it was clear that Ultron and his cronies were already there. Scott could hear their voices below him, too muffled to make out anything distinct. HIs jaw tightened with frustration, with anger. He activated his com with an abrupt motion. “Don’t go far. We’re late again.”

Allison’s acknowledgement was all but totally masked under the sound of Banshee’s preternatural scream from below him.

As dizzy as even the memory of that sound made him, Scott was galvanized into action. He allowed his shift to overtake him as he sprinted to the edge of the roof. With the claws of one hand dug into the building itself, Scott threw himself over the side, skidding down the side with a horrific screeching metal side. It was reckless, dangerous, but it was also the quickest way to get down the few floors to Dr. Yukimura’s lab.

It still wasn’t fast enough.

By the time Scott swung in feet-first through one of the windows, Ultron and the mutants were gone. So was the Regeneration Cradle. What was left in their wake was a room in ruin, wires sparking and shredded and laying haphazard across the space where Scott presumed the cradle had been. Slumped to one side was Noshiko Yukimura, her hands clutched over her stomach. Her expression was strained, and Scott was pretty sure even without his wolf’s senses, he’d have smelled the blood on the air.

Scott darted to her side immediately. He put his hands on her, hoping to draw her pain long enough to get her help, but she reached out to grab his forearm and squeezed, harder than he would have expected her capable of. “Listen. I will be fine. But Ultron. He made a body with the cradle. Now he is uploading himself into it. He has the gem from the scepter. With that power...he will be unstoppable. You must--”

Shaking his head, Scott tried to sound comforting. “No,  you’re injured, we have to get you treated--”

“GO!” Dr. Yukimura shouted, now shoving at the arm she’d laid her hands on. “I will...I will survive! He did not take everything. But if you do not stop him now, he  _ will _ .”

Reluctant, Scott pulled away. He tried not to listen to Noshiko’s sounds of pain as he rushed back out of the window he’d crashed through, back to skidding along the outside of the building in a gambit to get to the ground before Ultron did.

“Captain!” Allison’s voice crackled in over the coms; they’d been listening in on the conversation through his earpiece. Scott had been expecting that. “There’s a private jet with no manifest just submitted for takeoff at an airfield nearby. I’d bet money on that being him.”

Isaac cut in a second later, speaking over her with just as much urgency in his voice. “Cap, below you, the unmarked semi. He’s in there, with the cradle. I could take them out--”

Now, it was Scott’s turn to cut someone off, as he hurtled towards the ground. “No! The scepter gem is in there, too! We don’t know what kind of power it would unleash if you shot it.”

Isaac’s voice resonated in a low growl in Scott’s ear, but Scott ignored him. There was no other option. He had to storm that truck himself and stop it without releasing the gem’s power on an entire city.

The wind whipped at his face as he slid down the sheer face of the building, drawing tears. Scott ignored them. He ignored how his arm ached, the bones of his hands  _ burned _ , the terrible sound his claws made as he used them in a futile effort to slow his descent. He ignored all of it and kept his crimson eyes fastened on the top of the semi as it pulled away from the building and laboriously started to put on speed.

The truck was going to be too far from the building for Scott to just drop neatly onto it. Growling a faint curse to himself, Scott managed to get his boots beneath him, gathering his strength in his legs. He waited as long as he thought he possibly could, and then with a mighty roar, he pulled his claws free of the building and flung himself into the empty air.

He hit the top of the truck with bone-jarring force, denting the metal of the shipping container. From inside the trailer, Ultron made an incoherent sound of rage, and Scott only just managed to roll out of the divot his body had made on impact before the whole area was disintegrated from beneath by one of Ultron’s blasts. “You can’t stop progress, McCall! All you can do is get crushed under its wheels!”

Scott made a dark, unamused sound, and let himself drop along the side of the truck, dragging his claws through its siding like he’d done to the building. He’d just gotten the back doors of the truck open before he had to lurch out of the way again to avoid another blast. “Well, I guess the joke’s on you, then. Nothing that was supposed to kill me has actually managed.”

“Nothing else has been me.” Ultron said in a low, dangerous voice. He disconnected the upload cable from the back of his head and rushed out, zipping around to land on the battered top of the truck. Scott had to scramble to flip himself back up onto it.

Ultron was fast, and Ultron was strong.  _ Way _ too strong, stronger than Scott was by too many multiples. There was no give to his body, no relief or indication of damage when Scott struck him, no matter how many times they traded blows. It was all Scott could do just to stay on the truck. Every block of his shield, every blow, it was all answered with a strike that threw him back, knocked him off his feet, forced him to ricochet dangerously off of the surrounding cars just to give Isaac and Allison enough time to retrieve the Cradle.

Scott had no sense of how long he’d been fighting. All he knew was that he was losing ground. The truck they were fighting on was falling apart. He was running out of time.

Then, as it seemed she always did, Allison arrived at the exact right moment. Somehow, in the midst of the riotous cacophony of the fight, he heard her voice over the coms, “I’m boarding the truck. Keep him distracted.”

He redoubled his efforts. With a roar of pain and frustration, Scott sunk his claws deep into the exposed cabling and wires over Ultron’s shoulders. Digging both feet into what was left of the truck, he  _ wrenched _ his whole body, throwing Ultron off of the truck entirely. The robot flew erratically backwards and slammed into the support pillar of a nearby overpass.

For a second, no more, it looked like Scott had gotten the upper hand.

Then Ultron rebounded right off of that pillar and streaked in to slam into Scott bodily with all of the forgiveness of a speeding train.

Pain overwhelmed him. Scott blacked out for a few moments, incapable of dealing with the feeling of so many parts of him breaking at the same time. As always, that blissful nothingness didn’t last nearly long enough.

Instead, Scott woke up again on his back on the floor of a commuter train. Standing over him was Ultron, his stylized face pulled into a rictus grin. His fingertips were glowing a bright red, charging up the energy blast that would undoubtedly incinerate Scott.


End file.
